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Smith honored at Utica Hall of Fame

May 20, 2007
By RON MOSHIER


UTICA ? When he was a Cornhill teenager growing up on South Street, nobody else that big was that fast.

That rare combination of size and speed, though, wasn't the only reason why Utica's Will Smith wound up in the National Football League as a Pro Bowl defensive end with last year's NFC South champion New Orleans Saints.

The other?

Those close to him say he made the right moves off the field.

"I always thought Will was special," said former Thomas R. Proctor High School teammate Arnaldo Santiago. "I always thought he had talent, and I always thought he would do something with it because he had his head on straight.

"He was never the guy out running the streets. He never got into that type of thing. He could've chosen another path. He stayed away from the wrong people. He knew they were around, but he just never went that way."

Smith went in a different direction, graduating from Proctor in 2000 as a high school football All-American and soon after starring at Ohio State University, where he helped the unbeaten Buckeyes win a national championship as a junior.

Two years later, the Saints made Smith their first-round pick, 18th overall, in the NFL draft. And in his third NFL season, the 6-foot-3, 282-pound Pro Bowler with a knack for sacking quarterbacks came within a win of helping New Orleans reach the Super Bowl.

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