Sugar-Salem’s Tyler Rhoton Our Summit Orthopedics Athlete Of The Week (10/7)
In a surprise 21-7 upset win over the Shelley Russets, Sugar Salem has one digger in particular they may want to thank Tyler Rhoton who scored all 3 touchdowns of the game. But there’s also something a little more unique about this football star…
It’s 10:00 p.m. and the Sugar Salem diggers are just starting to hit the field for practice… Yep it’s not your usual high school practice time, but during this time of the year, football standout Tyler Rhoton and roughly half the Diggers football team spend a full day harvesting potatoes, before hitting the practice field.
“I wake up about 5:50 a.m., I work from 7 until we get done which is usually about 8 to 8:30 p.m.,” said Rhoton. “We have one lunch break, sometimes I get dinner sometimes I don’t, depending on how late I am getting to practice, I come home I get all my stuff ready for practice and have to make film by 9:30 p.m. and go until midnight, and then try to get some sleep for the next day.”
During these two weeks of harvest, Tyler gets one day off, game day! Well, that rest must’ve paid off scoring 18 of the Digger’s 21 points against Shelley.
“He just adds a spark to our football team, I think every year there’s one or two players that kind of add that little element,” said David Hastings, Sugar-Salem head coach.
“It’s really a team effort. I really have to give all my success to my teammates, to really my linemen and our great quarterback, he always puts it on me and it’s a lot of fun playing with these guys,” said Rhoton.
“He would be the first to tell you, ‘Hey it’s a team game. I didn’t get in the endzone by myself, it was our line or the other players.’ That’s just the type of person he is and we appreciate having him” reiterated Hastings.
Just two years ago Tyler transferred from Georgia when his dad got a teaching job at BYU-I, now the Sugar-Salem student body president, it seems he’s fitting in just fine.
“I think that brings a lot of, just one more step of respect and desire to get things done” said Hastings.
“It’s funny because when I moved from Boise to Georgia and they called me Idaho, when I moved back they called me Georgia” laughed Rhoton.
Congratulations “Georgia,” your peachy plays are just one of many reasons you’re this week’s Summit Orthopedics Athlete of the Week.
