DeRontae Lee performing at Northland

By News-Argus Staff
Published in Sports on May 21, 2004 1:56 PM

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Goldsboro High School graduate DeRontae Lee has been bouncng around the junior college football scene since he left North Carolina. His current stop -- Northland Technical College in Thief River Falls, Minnesota -- is where Lee hopes he will get notcied by Division I recruiters.

The wide receiver and kick returner played last season at Hutchinson Junior College in Hutchinson, Kansas along with fomer Goldsboro teammates Robert Coates and Travontay King. Lee got letters of interest from East Carolina, N.C. State, Clemson, Florida and Wake Forest, along with a letter from Ohio State.

He moved to Northland to get more playing time, and is off to a good start in the off-season conditioning. Northland runs a wing-T offense as opposed to Hutchinson's four-wide receiver set, but Lee said the team informed him that they would throw the ball more this coming season.

Lee dazzled recruiters at a junior college combine in Northern Minnseota with a 4.5-second 40-yard dash, a 37-inch vertical leap and a maximum-weight bench press of 275 pounds. Insiders.com ranked Lee as a top-five prospect in February 2004.

Lee is majoring in business and holds a 3.1 grade-point average. He said adjusting to the speed and the mental aspects of college football have been his hardest adjustments.

"In high school, I could outrun everybody," Lee said. "Here, everybody runs 4-3, 4-4. It makes me work harder."

If things work out as he hopes, Lee would attend N.C. State or East Carolina in 2005.