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Drew arrived in Tallahassee for his first
and only official visit at about 4:30 p.m. on Friday, January 23.
He came with his mother and older brother Will. He would be leaving
48 hours later. But in the meantime, he was going to have one of the
best weekends of his young life.
First, the Weatherfords checked into their rooms at the Radisson Hotel
in downtown Tallahassee. The suites met Drew’s approval. “Real nice,” he
said.
After hanging out for a little while and then taking a shower, it was time
for the visit to officially begin.
Drew and his family cruised downstairs and got comfortable mingling
with FSU’s coaches, some of the Seminoles’ current players, other top
recruits, and a slew of recruiting hostesses called “Garnet and Gold Girls.” Drew then met his host for the weekend, Florida State sophomore tight
end Matt Henshaw. The two seemed to click right away.
“He’s a real cool guy,” Drew said. “He reminds me a lot of my older
brothers and stuff, so it was fun.”
Then, after some polite conversation, it was off to feast on the best free
food they might ever have. The group would be dining at one of
Tallahassee’s finest restaurants, The Silver Slipper, and they were intent on
taking full advantage of it.
Drew had the filet mignon and a lobster tail.
“The food was unbelievable,” Drew said. “I took some to go, too. I had
to get some to go.”
The dinner lasted about two hours. Afterward, the group of recruits, parents,
coaches and player-hosts made their way over to head coach Bobby
Bowden’s house for some homemade dessert.
After that, it was time for the recruits to have some real fun. The parents
went back to the hotel. The coaches went home. And along came Florida
State’s top receiver with a big surprise.
Craphonso Thorpe, who was about to enter his senior year, knew how important this recruiting weekend was for the Seminoles. So he went all
out. He rented a party bus.
“It picked us up in front of the Bowdens’ house,” Drew said in sheer
amazement.
If Thorpe was looking to make a good impression on his future teammates,
it certainly worked.
After loading up, the recruits and their hosts hit the town. They went
from party to party and club to club. It was some kind of spectacle – more
than a dozen of the nation’s top football prospects cruising around
Tallahassee in a chartered bus.
“Oh man, we had a really good time,” Drew said.
The parties were the kind you would find in any college town. Booze,
hormones, more booze, and more hormones. While the recruits’ hosts
weren’t supposed to furnish alcohol to the prospects – they were minors,
after all – it was always available.
“If you sincerely don’t want to drink, they’re not going to make you
drink,” Drew said. “But one of the objectives is to go out and have as good
a time as you can, and of course that increases how much you have.
“But when I told them that I didn’t want to drink, they had no problem
with that really.”
It was a pretty familiar scene for Drew. While his friends would be
chugging beers or downing shots, he almost always opted for a water or a
soda. It had been like that for a while, ever since he decided to stop drinking
as a sophomore at Land O’Lakes.
“It’s something I did when I was much younger, too young,” Drew
admitted. “And it’s something I’ve just made a decision not to do anymore.”
So it was easy for Drew to have a good time at a party without a beer in
his hand. Especially when there were other things to occupy his time –
namely, girls.
Florida State has long held a reputation, and rightfully so, of having
some of the finest looking co-eds in the country. And Drew was getting a
look at plenty of them on Friday night. They were everywhere. Every party
they went to, every place they stopped, the beautiful women seemed to
multiply.
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