Sam Waller

Toughness is a pretty much a necessary quality for a football player. Coaches especially like to see it in their defensive players.

At McMurry, coach Hal mumme doesn't need to worry about whether or not safety Jimmy Terrell is tough.

As a senior at Lexington High School in 2006, suffered an injury in practice that would have caused most to hang up their helmets without a second thought.

"We were working on our two-minute offense," said Terrell, who played wide receiver in high school. "I ran a post route and the quarterback overthrew the football. I was just running and watching the ball, not really paying attention to where I was on the field.

"At the end of our end zone, there's a big wheel that held the water hose that we used to water our practice field. Hanging off that wheel was about a 2½-foot metal bar with a hook on the end of it that they used to tow the wheel around. I'm running and watching the ball and I dive for it. That bar goes under my facemask, into my mouth and smashes everything."

Terrell's injuries included a smashed papate, dislocated jaw and four missing teeth.

"I could look down and see my two front teeth hanging out in front of my face," he said.

Told he would be out eight weeks, Terrell was back in three. He helped Lexington win the District 26-2A title and advance to the Division II semifinals before the Eagles lost to eventual state champion Mart.

At McMurry, Terrell was among a large group that didn't join the team until the start of fall drills. Originally planning to play receiver in Mumme's Air Raid offense, Terrell wound up winning the starting job at strong safety.

"We could tell he was such a physical player," Mumme said. "He's got good skills, good speed and good strength. He was kind of a natural on defense. We felt like we were wasting him at receiver. He's really done a good job so far."

In two games, Terrell has nine solo tackles and eight assists with 2½ tackles for loss, an interception and a pass breakup. Whether offense or defense, he said, playing for McMurry is exactly where he wants to be.

"With these coaches, you can learn a lot from them," he said. "I couldn't ask for anything better than an opportunity like we have here."

Terrell especially looks forward to helping the Nation end a losing streak that has grown to 15 games entering Saturday's American Southwest Conference opener against Mississippi College. That task has been all the harder with the late hiring of Mumme and his staff, not to mention the large number of new players trying to learn the system while also developing chemistry that comes from playing together.

"I don't take that as an excuse, being rushed with everything and trying to get everything together," Terrell said. "I feel like we're good enough. We definitely have a good enough staff that we ought to be winning these games. It's tough to deal with these two close losses, but we learned a lot of good lessons. Things are definitely going to start turning around."