After four years of being a varsity starter for the Lions in both football and basketball, and being a two-way starter on the gridiron, VHS senior Adarius Williams will be focusing on just one sport and one side of the ball for the next four years, as he signed a letter of intent with Texas Wesleyan University Monday afternoon.
While Adarius made his mark first in the defensive secondary, where he started his freshman year, starting his sophomore season he also became a key cog in the backfield for the Lions and was recruited by the Rams to play on the offensive side of the football.
“They’re looking at me at running back, or somewhere on offense,” Adarius said prior to his letter signing ceremony. “I’m excited. When I visited the school I really liked the campus. It is a smaller school, but it is in Fort Worth, so it’s a pretty good combination. It has that small-school feel, but it’s in the city.”
The Texas Wesleyan Rams play in the Sooner Athletic Conference of the NAIA. The Rams were conference champions last year, going undefeated against conference opponents including Texas College, Oklahoma Panhandle State, Wayland Baptist, Langston, and Ottawa University of Arizona.
“I’m thankful Adarius is getting this opportunity to play at the next level,” Kevin Sherrill, Vernon Athletic Director/Head Football Coach, told the audience of students and staff who attended the signing ceremony. “I can’t thank him enough for everything – from his leadership on the field, in the locker room and in the classroom. Adarius was a pleasure to coach. Without guys like him there is no way we would be where we are now with our football program or our athletic program in general.”
The 2024 football season was Coach Sherrill’s fourth as the head coach of the Lions, and he’s had Adarius with him on the field all four of those seasons. But, Adarius caught the coach’s attention before he showed up for two-a-day workouts his freshman year.
“I started here in the middle of the spring semester in 2021 when Adarius was an eighth grader, and the first time I visited the Middle School to see our junior high athletes and saw him in athletics and talked to him, I could just tell right then that this was a young man you could build a program around,” Sherrill said. “You could tell he had that type of character and he was that talented. He has definitely made an impact on our football, basketball and track programs.”
During his four years on varsity Adarius earned all-academic all-district honors in football and basketball every year. He received all-district first or second team honors all four years for basketball. Adarius suffered a leg injury in a non-district game in football which forced him to miss several district games. After making the all-district first team his first three years, he received honorable mention honors for the 2024 season.
For his Lions football career, Adarius rushed for over 1,700 yards, while scoring 27 total touchdowns, to go along with 250 yards receiving, and 11 interceptions on defense. Adarius rushed for 680 yards last season despite playing just half the season.
Lions Basketball Head Coach Mark Wynn echoed Coach Sherrill’s sentiments.
“Adarius deserves the chance to play at the next level,” he said. “He works hard all the time, whether it’s basketball or football. I’m proud of him.”
While it is obvious that Adarius has had an impact on the Lions athletic program over the last four years, he has also made impacts in other ways. The senior, who is in the Top 10 academically-ranked students in the Class of 2025, is a member of several extra-curricular organizations including PALS. In that program, high school students spend a class period at one of the elementary schools as a teacher’s aide.
Dalene Hamer, an instructional aide at VHS, said while she has never had Adarius in a classroom, he has made an impact on her family.
“Just from watching him while he’s been at VHS I know he is a young man of integrity,” she said. “But, I’m thankful to him because I have a fourth-grade daughter who didn’t care about sports at all, but because of Adarius taking time to play with her on the playground at school, she now loves sports.”
Coach Edwin Bah, a football and basketball assistant, summed it the best.
“You know, in the locker room the guys will bring up players from the past, the Lion heroes that people always talk about. Well, AD is now one of those players who the young kids of today will talk about and remember when they’re in middle school and high school,” Bah said.