Specialist Path' Dave Harrington

Most Tennessee fans are not familiar with the name David Harrington, but I believe the phrase “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure” certainly applies to this former University of Tennessee walk on punter.

Dave has taken a long road to become a starting punter in College Football but his unorthdox path has been vital in his development as the starting punter at Idaho State University.

Find out how Dave’s path brought him from the beautiful beaches of California to the majestic mountains of Tennessee and finally to the state known best for its potatoes, Idaho.

This story is great for kicking specialists who are waiting for their opportunity or who are looking to know more about the process of transferring to a new school.

This is Dave Harrington ‘On A Specialists Path’.

Dave always had a natural ability to punt a football and started to really develop his skills through repetition.

“I first decided I wanted to be a punter when my high school after workouts one day asked if anybody wanted to be the punter”, Dave said.

“Our punter the previous year had graduated and the coaching staff was in need of a guy so I said to myself, yeah I could do that, I had seen enough games on TV and thought how hard could it be?”

Dave had a natural ability to punt but he learned most of his technique through many days of trial and error at the local park.

“The coaches brought me a bag of balls and said to get to work, so I went home and went to the park by my house and just started kicking away, not knowing what I was doing”, Dave said.”

He certainly was doing some things right because he really opened some people’s eyes with his towering punts. He gained a lot of confidence after winning a few kicking camps and after a brief stint at Orange Coast Community College, he decided to walk on at the University of Tennessee.

Dave chose Tennessee after studying the depth charts of schools and because he wanted to play big time College Football.

Because of Tennessee’s lack of depth at punter, Dave was able to come right in during Two a Days and compete with incumbent punter Chad Cunningham for the job. Like most young kicking specialists, he was very talented but also very immature.

He could hit a towering punt with five second hang time or shank one off the side of his foot. Consistency was something that was tough for him to reach and a big part of it was because of his never-ending need to impress the coaches. This led to the coaches choosing to redshirt him.

“I learned so much at Tennessee, and I will always be grateful for the time I spent there and the things I learned, Tennessee will always be a special place to me”, Dave said.

“I learned the ins and outs of a major college football program, redshirting there could not have benefited me more in my development as a punter. Just going through practice every day and experiencing that, gave me a lot of confidence which I carried over to Idaho State.”

There were a few times during last season that Dave was given a chance to seriously compete for the starting punting job, but he was never able to fully translate his success in his charting before practice and carry it over into live punt team.

As the season finished Lane Kiffin bolted for USC and Coach Dooley entered as head coach. Like most coaches, Coach Dooley wanted his own players in the program and after signing two talented punters Michael Palardy and Matt Darr, Dave was made expendable. This is the nature of the beast in major College Football.

“One of the toughest moments for me was during my meeting with Coach Dooley”, Dave said.”

“He told me that they couldn’t give me a scholarship, and I came to the realization that I just couldn’t afford to be a walk on anymore and that I would have to leave the University of Tennessee. I had come to love the university and its football program. I would be lying if I said that I didn’t get a little emotional.”

It is interesting that two walk on punters from last year’s team are now starting at other Universities: Dave Harrington (Idaho State) and Josh Davis (MTSU). Both players have been named Players of the Week by their prospective conferences.

Once Dave had the conversation with Coach Dooley, he began to explore his options at other universities across the country.

“During that whole process of getting my release from the university I had been contacting some of my coaches from my junior college and they had been working the phones for me”, Dave said.
“I literally sent out a 100 emails to different schools around the country looking for anybody that could use a punter. One of the first schools to get back to me and show real interest was Idaho State.”

“Eddie Johnson who I had been working with for a few years and is the greatest punter to come out of Idaho State. He told the coaches that I was available and that they should definitely take a chance on me. So I took my visit and fell in love with the place.

That gamble has certainly paid off as Dave is averaging 44 yards a punt and has hit 12 punts of 50 yards or more this season. Check out this article on the Idaho website of his recent punting success http://www.isubengals.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/100310aac.html .

Dave dreams of one day following in the footsteps of his two childhood heroes in punting.

“My biggest punting influences were definitely Ray Guy and Shane Lechler, I’ve always been a Raider fan and it just so happened that the best punters in NFL history are Raiders. I always wondered if I had the ability of Ray and the strength of Lechler, I would be the perfect punter.”

Dave may not be the perfect punter just yet, but Idaho State certainly got a good one in Dave “Hang Time” Harrington.

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