Washington's Cooper makes oral commitment to Temple football

A while back, some Division I college football programs sent letters of interest to George Washington High's Daquan Cooper, asking for game tapes.

"I'm kind of lazy," he said, laughing. "I didn't do it right away. My uncle [Reuben White, former star running back at Washington] was on my back about it and I just started doing it lately."

No need to continue, folks.

The 5-11, 165-pound Cooper, a rising senior who's being viewed as a wideout, yesterday made an oral commitment to Temple during a phone call with coach Al Golden and several assistants.

He becomes the second Eagle within a week to commit to becoming an Owl. Brandon Chudnoff, another rising senior slated to play defensive end/outside linebacker, did so last Tuesday.

The wheels began turning - furiously, even - during a recent camp at Temple.

"I didn't go there with the idea of playing so nice that they'd wind up offering me a scholarship," Cooper said. "I just wanted to learn new things and try to get better.

"They had maybe four-five groups of wideouts with maybe 10 guys in each. I was running good routes and catching all the balls. The coaches kept giving me compliments, saying how well I was doing. Then they moved me to another group, which seemed to have all the best guys in it. I kept it going there."

Cooper also fared well when the wideouts worked on defensive back skills.

"Know what helped me?" he said. "The instructions those coaches were giving me were the same ones I'd already gotten from my Washington coaches. That helped. Though I did a good job on defense, I feel I'll do best at wide receiver and that's where Temple wants me."

Ohio State, Rutgers and Duke were among the schools that sent form letters to Cooper, who lives near Wadsworth and Michener, in Mount Airy.

His future major: Undecided.

"I was thinking sports management," he said. "But it seems like a lot of people are going for that, so I'll come up with something else when I get there."

Rising Malvern Prep senior Joe Lubanski, an outfielder/DH, has committed to play baseball at Yale. His brother, Mike, a catcher, recently completed his freshman year at Wake Forest. Oldest brother Chris (Kennedy-Kenrick, 2003) is an outfielder for Toronto's Class AAA team in Las Vegas. *