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Often ignored and overlooked, walk-ons face unique challenges on their climbs to the top.
By Phoebe Weintraub
2 hours ago
Four walk-on athletes in action in their respective sports.
Credit: Lydia Tong
There exists a group of student-athletes on almost every sports team that doesn’t often get recognized for their contributions. Though they possess superb athletic talent, practice every day, sacrifice personal time, and come to or play in every game, they might never be asked for a post-game interview. These athletes are the backbone of their teams. They’re walk-ons.
Sam Smith | Kicker, Football
Depending on the person you ask, there is a stigma surrounding walk-ons. They aren’t sought out by universities due to fewer years of experience with their sport. As a result, walk-ons might receive looks of disdain from sports fans, or superiority from their teammates. Sometimes it’s self-imposed, a feeling with which junior football kicker Sam Smith is familiar.
“When I first started telling people I was a walk-on, I was honestly … super ashamed,” Smith admitted. “I was super, just super embarrassed of being a walk-on like I wasn’t good enough to get recruited.”
Coming from Maryland’s Quince Orchard High School, which prioritizes achievement in football, Smith felt he should have accomplished more athletically before college. He chased the popularity experienced by classmates who posted their recruitment status on social media.
“I always wanted to be the one to post that get a little bit of clout. Like, who doesn’t want a little bit of clout, right?” he said.
To cut him some slack, Smith only played one year of football in high school: his senior year. He played center mid in soccer up until junior year, which lent him some help when he started to kick. It was a good thing he switched sports because, during his first football season, his team went undefeated and won the state championship. Smith’s contributions earned him All-State Second Team Honors and First-Team All-County Awards.
“It was a pretty good year for me, I’m not gonna lie,” he laughed.
Because he only played football for one year, formal recruitment was out of the question. Smith admitted he didn’t even know how the process worked. He recalled that former Penn cornerback and then-coach Eric Franklin, who currently coaches at Cornell, reached out to him and a teammate and informed them that if they could get into Penn on their own, they had spots on the team. This interaction made Smith a preferred walk-on, as opposed to a typical walk-on who has to formally try out for the team once enrolled.
Upon arriving at Penn for summer camp, Smith met the rest of the team. He remembered the slight disparity between recruits and walk-ons in terms of athletic apparel distribution. While recruits were gifted an excessive amount of clothes and shoes, the walk-ons received only the necessities.
“I was like, oh, here we go. Here’s the walk-on culture,” Smith said. ‘Literally, all the walk-on stories I’ve heard of like on TV and stuff. It’s coming true.”
He laughs about it now, pointing out that being a walk-on never affected his relationships within the football community. He worked as hard as possible on Wednesdays, the practice dedicated to the third-string kicker, which resulted in the day being named after him: Sam’s Super Bowl. In retrospect, Smith realized how his status as a walk-on gave him the “clout” he desired in high school because it proved his academic prowess.
“Everyone [was] like, ‘no way you actually got in here on academics, no way, how’s that possible?’” he said. “…So honestly being a walk-on is cool, and being a walk-on is one of the really special titles you can get at this school, and I cherish every minute of it.”
Though football comes with a demanding schedule, Smith expressed gratitude for how Penn football has changed his life and college experience.
“I thank [football] for that, because it’s really helped me grow as a person and as a man, and it’s helped me with time management and just knowing that life isn’t fair.”
John Ruvo IV | Wide Receiver, Football
Smith’s teammate, junior wide receiver John Ruvo IV, is also a walk-on who didn’t play football as his primary focus in high school. Ruvo was a track and field recruit to Penn, sprinting the 100m and 200m, until he realized he missed the camaraderie and brotherhood of football.
“[During] winter break freshman year, [it] kind of hit me again. I was like, I want to play football again,” Ruvo said.
The Scottsdale, Ariz. native evaluated track and field as a very individualistic sport because “your performance only represents yourself” whereas in football your performance represents that of the entire team. Though he would miss his track teammates, Ruvo was ready for the change. He sent in his film and waited. It took months, but by that summer he received an invitation to fall camp.
Joining the team as a sophomore, Ruvo was initially concerned about being the new guy and being a year behind the bonding experience. His worries were quickly lulled, thanks to the hospitality of the football program who welcomed Ruvo with open arms.
Ruvo agreed with Smith that walk-ons are treated the same as recruits, though Ruvo takes on a different mindset to ensure he improves his game.
“For me personally, though, I like to treat myself like … I’m at a disadvantage, just to push myself harder,” Ruvo said.
Ruvo’s work ethic is his version of a solution to the pressure he feels as a walk-on, whether it’s self-imposed or coming from the coaches.
“I do feel a bit more pressure just because I walked onto the team compared to someone getting recruited, so I feel like I have a little bit more to prove,” he admitted.
Rowen Hildreth | Rower, Heavyweight Rowing
This mental pressure is an expected burden of the walk-on experience regardless of sport. Sophomore men’s heavyweight rower Rowen Hildreth spoke about the frustration and pressure he felt just to reach the same level as his recruited teammates.
“When you’re in a lower boat, and you’re not performing as well as a lot of other people, … you have to work really hard to start to improve enough just to be at the same level as everybody else,” he said. “[It’s] hard because you’re not necessarily getting a lot of recognition for all the work you’re doing; … you’re just sort of at the same level as everyone, you’re not rising above.”
Hildreth had a particularly rough start to the rowing season freshman year. He battled three consecutive illnesses: COVID-19, mononucleosis, and pneumonia. Consequently, he missed many practices at the beginning of the season. While recovery was the primary goal, he was mostly concerned with the optics of his sickness.
“That’s a really, really bad look when you walk on a team, you’re saying, hey, I’m signing up to do this … I just want to do this, and then to turn around and be physically unable to do it for a month at a time,” he said.
Luckily, Hildreth’s illnesses didn’t impede his introduction to the team, and he was later able to put in the work alongside his teammates. As a walk-on, he had to build up his fitness, which was the easiest of his hurdles. While there is the expectation for walk-ons to prove their worth and earn their spot, Hildreth felt that the preconceived notions quickly drop once each rower is in the same position, fighting for their spots in the boat.
“Once you’re here, there’s not really a big wall between you and the other guys in your class who are recruited,” Hildreth said.
He expressed gratitude for the sport and explained that its structure has provided him with both a community and a “purpose in life.”
“I was pleasantly surprised that I think academically, I’m better off than I would have been without the team because I’m taking classes with my teammates,” Hildreth said. “We are able to work together and support each other.”
Similar to Smith, Hildreth is a preferred walk-on. Al Monte, head coach for men’s heavyweight rowing, approved Hildreth as a walk-on during his senior — allowing Hildreth to bypass the tryout process.
According to Hildreth, about half of the walk-ons have a story similar to his, while the other half are true novices to the sport. He specifically saluted senior Cole Suplee, who had never rowed before coming to Penn. It was only Suplee’s second year rowing when Hildreth made the team.
“When I got there, I saw that he had put in a ton of training over the summer, and had suddenly become one of the better rowers on the team,” Hildreth said. “And he was a big inspiration, just to see that it’s possible as a walk-on to really meaningfully contribute.”
Cole Suplee | Rower, Penn Heavyweight Rowing
In high school, Suplee athletically focused on cross country, hockey, and track and field. While he would have liked to have been recruited for those sports, he acknowledged that he wasn’t prolific enough at any particular sport to warrant attention.
Despite this, once Suplee arrived at Penn’s campus, he felt an ache for team sports. Because of his experience in running, he initially set his sights on the track and field team. After weeks of training, Suplee could tell that track wasn’t in the cards.
“I was just like not hitting the times I needed, and feeling really burned out,” Suplee said. “[I] really used to enjoy it, then [I] just started to hate it.”
Wanting to do anything athletic, Suplee eventually decided to try rowing. To ease his anxiety about being a novice in a room full of veterans, Suplee adopted an attitude acknowledging his lack of skill.
“When you accept that you’re not going to be at the top of the charts for a little while [and you have to do] a lot of work to get there, it takes some of the anxiety out,” he said.
Though Suplee was already “in shape” athletically, his first couple of months on the team focused on rowing fitness and training his body to fit the rower’s standard. Suplee believes it doesn’t matter how fit a person is: rowing requires a new standard of cardiovascular and muscular fitness.
While he learned the fundamentals of rowing, Suplee floated around Penn’s rowing community, picking up skills from different groups as he prepared for the demands of men’s heavyweight rowing.
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“I had to practice with the lightweight team, the women’s team, obviously switching between the groups, just because they didn’t have a boat for me on the heavyweight team,” Suplee said.
Becoming confident as a rower took some time for Suplee, but he credits his teammates as inspiration along his journey. Following their example, Suplee has pushed himself to become a successful rower, ultimately rowing in the IRA National Championships, which Suplee considers one of his best rowing memories.
“A lot of hard work went into that [which] validated the fact that I’m actually moving somewhere with [rowing],” Suplee said.
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