PROVIDENCE, R.I. — He was recently selected to the All-Ivy League first team and will graduate in May with a mechanical engineering degree from one of the oldest and most prestigious universities in the country.
Jacob Supron has a lot to be thankful for these days and none of it would have been possible without the guidance and support of Mansfield Senior football coach Chioke Bradley.
“Coach Bradley believed in me before I believed in myself,” said Supron, a 2011 Senior High graduate and senior cornerback at Brown University in Providence, R.I.
It was Bradley, a Mansfield Senior graduate and a four-year starting defensive back at Division I Bowling Green, who first saw the potential in Supron. Bradley was an assistant coach on Jamie Masi’s staff in the fall of 2008, Supron’s sophomore year.
“Jacob was a big-time wrestler and baseball player. Football was his third sport. The only reason he went out is because his buddies were playing football,” Bradley said. “He was playing junior varsity and the guys we had on the varsity team weren’t getting the job done. We pulled up Jacob and (fellow sophomore) Mitch Tridico to play with Jamarkus O’Neal and Shaquille Jefferson in the secondary.
“Jacob didn’t want to leave the JV team, though. He said he felt like he would be letting those guys down, so for four weeks he was playing on Friday nights and Saturday mornings. I finally sat him down and told him, ‘You’ve got to let the JV team go.’ ”
Supron was an All-Ohio Cardinal Conference second team pick as a junior and a first teamer as a senior, when he had 85 tackles and four interceptions. He was an All-Northwest District first team pick in Division II and an All-Ohio special mention selection.
“Coach Bradley told me, ‘I know what it takes to play at a high level and you have what it takes,’ ” Supron said. “That is when I really started to think about college football.”
Bradley’s next job was selling Supron, an Academic All-Ohioan and the salutatorian of Senior High’s 216-member Class of 2011, to a college program.
“We had just about every Ivy League school in here. We’re talking about Harvard and Princeton,” said Bradley, who took over as head coach in 2010, Supron’s senior season. “But I couldn’t get Mid-American Conference schools to bite.
“Brown had a strong engineering program and Jacob had family in Rhode Island. It was a slam dunk.”
The 6-foot, 185-pound Supron played on Brown’s unbeaten junior varsity team as a freshman before getting promoted in 2012. He appeared in six games as a sophomore and had seven tackles on special teams.
“Playing on special teams early in my career gave me confidence,” Supron said. “A lot of guys have doubts about playing at this level, especially at a place like Brown where people come from such varying backgrounds.
“I realized then that I could play here.”
Injuries slowed Supron in the fall of 2013, but he still appeared in all 10 games as a junior. He made 27 tackles, setting the stage for his breakout senior season.
Supron had a career-high 42 tackles this fall as the Bears went 5-5 overall and finished fifth in the eight-team Ivy League at 3-4. He picked off a team-high two passes and was selected the College Sports Madness Ivy League Player of the Week after making five tackles and returning an interception 27 yards in Brown’s 20-13 win over Rhode Island in early October. It was the 99th meeting between the in-state rivals and Brown’s fourth straight victory in the series.
“Jacob and I were walking out of the postgame press conference with the Governor’s Cup trophy and we said, ‘We’ve come a long way from the 419 (area code),’ ” said Brown starting quarterback and captain Marcus Fuller, an Ashland High School graduate. “I’m not surprised at all that Jacob was an All-Ivy League first team pick. I’ve gone against him in practice and seen him develop into one of the best cornerbacks in our league. It’s been a big transition because he was a safety when I played against him in high school.”
A position change wasn’t the biggest challenge awaiting Supron. Juggling football and an Ivy League academic load is every bit as difficult as it sounds.
“Academically, I came in a little more confident than I should have been,” Supron said with a laugh. “I thought football was going to be the hardest thing to handle and then in my first semester I barely passed my math class. I was fortunate that everything worked out.”
The past four years have been a blur for Supron, who will intern with IMI Cornelius next semester in the company’s product design and development division. According to its web site, IMI Cornelius is world’s leading supplier of beverage dispensing and cooling equipment.
“You have no idea how quickly the time has flown by,” Supron said. “It seems like I was playing in the Madison game just yesterday.”
While he plans to pursue a career in product design, Supron hasn’t ruled out a return to football.
“I would love to coach one day and that is something I never really considered before this year,” Supron said. “The longer I’ve played football, the more I realize how much football has shaped my life. The most influential people in my life are my dad and my football coaches.
“If Chioke hadn’t been looking out for me, I wouldn’t have had the opportunities that I’ve had.”
That point was reinforced after Supron’s final game, a 41-7 win over Columbia last Saturday.
“After the game Jacob went up to (Brown assistant coach) Neil McGrath, who had recruited him, to thank him for the opportunity,” Supron’s father, Chris, said. “Coach McGrath told Jacob, ‘I appreciate the gesture, but you should go home and thank your high school coach because he’s the one who convinced us to take you.’”
“Chioke was such a catalyst for Jacob and a lot of kids in Mansfield. He identifies the ones with potential and opens the door for them.”
For Bradley, it is a labor of love — especially in Supron’s case.
“Jacob Supron is Mansfield kid who is going to graduate with an engineering degree from an Ivy League school and he was an All-Ivy League football player,” Bradley said. “When is the last time that happened? That should be celebrated.
“I’m so proud of him.”
