It all started with Jabrill 

Peppers.

On May 26, 2013, the 

New Jersey native made an 
appearance on ESPN, where 
he performed a freestyle rap, 
pulled out a winged helmet 
and officially committed to 
play football at Michigan.

Just like that, the No. 

1 recruit in the state was 
headed to Ann Arbor. The 
exodus had begun.

New Jersey wasn’t always 

a hotbed for college football 
recruits. 
Freshman 
safety 

and 
Jersey 
native 
Brad 

Hawkins remembers when 
his home was known only as 
“the basketball state.”

But eventually — perhaps 

while scouting stars like 
Peppers — teams saw what 

they were missing. Michigan, 
along with a collection of 
the nation’s elite programs, 
began mining for talent and 
enticed recruits to play their 
college football outside of 
their home state.

Chris 
Ash 
aimed 
to 

halt that process when he 
accepted the head coaching 
job in Piscataway just under 
two years ago.

He helped coin the phrase 

“Fence the Garden” — a 
mantra meant to symbolize 
Rutgers’ focus on keeping 
the best high school football 
players in New Jersey to 
continue 
their 
college 

careers.

And with the phrase came 

an odd rivalry.

At the beginning of June 

in 
2016, 
Jim 
Harbaugh 

organized one of his then-
infamous satellite camps at 

Paramus Catholic — Peppers’ 
old stomping grounds. On 
the same day, Ash brought 
in 
Urban 

Meyer 
to 

host a camp 
of his own 
just over six 
miles 
away 

at 
Fairleigh 

Dickinson 
University.

Rutgers 

students had 
their 
own 

response, 
too. 
The 

Order of the 
Bull’s Blood 
— a secret 
society at the 
university 
— claimed responsibility for 
acts of vandalism at Paramus 
Catholic that occurred in the 
days leading up to Michigan’s 

camp.

All 
past 
drama 
aside, 

though, Ash’s “Fence the 

Garden” 
mantra, to this 
point, appears 
to be all it was.

Roughly 
a 

month 
after 

the 
inception 

of the phrase, 
Rashan 
Gary 

— then the top-
ranked recruit 
in the nation 
— 
committed 

to 
Michigan. 

Kareem 
Walker, 
the 

top-ranked 
running 
back 

in 
the 
state, 

joined him.

A year later, the trend 

continued. Drew Singleton, 
a Union City, N.J. native 

ranked 
as 
the 
fifth-best 

recruit in the state according 
to the ESPN 300, signed a 
letter of intent to play at 
Michigan.

They aren’t the only ones 

either. 
The 
list 
includes 

Gary, 
Walker, 
Singleton, 

Hawkins, Hunter Reynolds, 
Joe 
Beneducci, 
Michael 

Dwumfour, 
Jon 
Runyan, 

Juwann 
Bushell-Beatty, 

Cheyenn Robinson and Ron 
Johnson. All on Michigan’s 
roster. All hail from New 
Jersey.

Some came before Peppers. 

Some came with him. But the 
majority came after him.

All 
it 
took 
was 
an 

appearance 
on 
national 

television.

“I think it definitely (opens 

the door), because growing 
up in Jersey, we looked up 
to guys like Jabrill when I 

was a kid,” Dwumfour said. 
“... When he made the move 
here, it definitely opened 
the eyes of guys like me in 
Jersey.”

***

The logic is simple.
“Jersey 
guys, 
we 
like 

to 
win,” 
Dwumfour 
said 

of 
Michigan’s 
increased 

presence in his home state. 
“So wherever fits us right 
and feels like home, that’s 
where we want to be.”

Unfortunately for Rutgers, 

it has failed to fit that criteria 
for a long time now.

Ray Rice was a sophomore 

the last time the Scarlet 
Knights 
had 
a 
10-win 

season. That came in 2006, 
when Greg Schiano’s team 
punctuated an 11-2 season in 
the Big East with a victory 
over Kansas State in the 
Texas Bowl. Before that, you 
would need to go back to 1976 
to find double digits in the 
win column.

The 
Scarlet 
Knights 

haven’t had a winning season 
in the Big Ten since their 
inaugural year when they 
finished 8-5 and beat North 
Carolina in the Quick Lane 
Bowl. And in the past two 
seasons, Rutgers has finished 
a combined 6-18.

It’s for those reasons that 

Hawkins and Bushell-Beatty 
remember growing up with 
little exposure to Rutgers 
football.

As a kid in New Jersey, 

Hawkins recalls watching 
“whoever gets the TV time 
pretty much.” The Scarlet 
Knights rarely received that 
big of a stage.

Someday they might, but 

to 
Nunzio 
Campanile 
— 

the head coach at Bergen 
Catholic 
in 
Oradell, 
N.J. 

— it’s a process that will 
inevitably take time.

“I think that success is 

relative,” 
Campanile 
said. 

“I think that if they start 
getting to the point where 
they’re winning five, six, 
seven games, I think some 
of those higher-level players 
might be willing to take that 

FootballSaturday, October 28, 2017
4

‘M’ impedes Rutgers’ fight for Jersey

KEVIN SANTO

Managing Sports Editor

FILE PHOTO/Daily

Special teams coordinator Chris Partridge had experience in the New Jersey college football recruiting landscape, as he served as the head coach of Paramus Catholic for five years.

New Jersey has plenty of talent. The problem is that the Scarlet Knights can’t seem to hold on to it. 

Growing up 
in Jersey, we 

looked up 
to guys like 

Jabrill when I 

was kid