Jul 26
2009His sights are set on the NFL
07.26.09
BY MERLE ENGLISH, Newsday.com
His sights are set on the NFL
Plaques, medallions and awards adorn the room Terrell Williams shares with his younger brother. His mother counted more than 40 that the Hempstead High School star athlete brought home.
“He has them on the walls, on top of a dresser and on top of a television stand,” Angela Mincey said. “He moved a computer to keep them.”
Mincey doesn’t mind the sports decor that overwhelms much of her Hempstead apartment, because the trophies are recognition of her older son’s prowess in football, basketball and track.
“My dream is to make it to the NFL,” Williams said.
His coaches believe Williams, 18, who was a running back for the Hempstead High School Tigers, has what it takes. They acclaim him for his athletic ability and humility despite extraordinary accomplishments.
Williams earned all-county recognition in football, basketball and indoor and outdoor track. In football - the sport he loves most - he set eight school records. In a Hempstead-Massapequa game this past Oct. 11, he had 436 yards running and receiving, and scored five touchdowns. The Nassau County High School Football Coaches Association voted him the best player in Nassau.
He was named to the first team on the 2008 New York State Sportswriters Association’s All-State football team and was the winner of the 2008 Thorp Award, named for the late Tom Thorp, who was the first president of the Nassau County Football League and one of the country’s leading football officials.
Newsday presents the award to the outstanding football player in Nassau County.
Bob Herzog, a Newsday high school sports reporter, spoke with Williams as he prepared for the Outback Steakhouse Empire Challenge All-star Game at Hofstra in June. Herzog said, “He scored on an 87-yard touchdown run in that game, the highlight of the night.
“He was the most explosive player I covered all season,” Herzog said. “He could score from anywhere on the field at any time and by any method.”
Williams became the Tigers’ captain as a junior and ended his three-year varsity career with 4,799 all-purpose yards and 42 touchdowns. He graduated in June and now needs money to realize his dream.
Several universities, including Hofstra and Stony Brook, have shown an interest in Williams, but his choice is Syracuse, which has an NCAA Division I football program. “It’s a great school,” Williams said. “They have a tradition to produce great NFL players.”
He must improve his core subject grades, however, to meet academic requirements of the NCAA, which determines eligibility for scholarships to the major colleges. “It’s currently a C-plus,” he said. “I’m reaching for an A. I’m willing to put in the hard work.”
Williams hopes he can do that at a college preparatory school. Financial aid is available at Bridgton Academy in Maine and St. Thomas More in Connecticut, two schools that interest him. Annual tuition and board cost around $40,000. Williams will need $10,000 to $14,000 to fill the gap. “It’s a lot of money,” he remarked.
Williams currently works as a groundskeeper for Hempstead parks and is trying to save, but won’t have anywhere near what he will need. His single mother was laid off from a full-time job doing procurement for an oil company and recently started another as a police aide. She is the sole provider for Williams and his brother, Steve, 16.
“I can’t afford it,” Mincey, 40, said. “I just started my job. I wasn’t making much money before, and I’m struggling now. It’s very hard because we’re in a recession. I have two kids, and they’re boys and they’re expensive. I basically live for them.”
She would like to see Williams succeed. “I just want him to be happy. He’s a good child, a very humble child,” she said.
Don Ryan, a trustee of Hempstead Village and retired business teacher at Hempstead High School, who “had the pleasure to watch him grow as an athlete and as a person,” is seeking donations to help the youngster start prep school in the fall.
Ryan has mentored Williams since he was a boy playing in the Hempstead Village football league and in the Biddy Basketball league, a competitive program for children that Ryan coached at the Salvation Army center in Hempstead.
“He was a delight, dependable, enthusiastic and bright, and one of the joys of the coaching profession,” Ryan said. “Prep school would give him a chance to blossom. He has a bright future if we can give him this chance to improve. ” Williams received the Salvation Army’s Sportsmanship Award and recently its His sights are set on the NFL Newsday (New York) July 26, 2026 Sunday Ambassador Award for community service presented to its college-bound volunteers. Williams has gone back often over the years to coach or referee at the center.
If he gets help raising the prep school funds, Williams said, “I would always help them back, just in case they might be in need one day. I want to really go to school, so I can help kids be on the right path, follow their dreams. I would like to be a coach like the coaches who helped me.”
Don Ryan may be reached
at 516-383-6070 or by e-mail at
LOAD-DATE: July 26, 2026
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH
GRAPHIC: Photo by Joseph D. Sullivan - Hempstead High School running back Terrell Williams, 18, needs financial help to get a chance to go to a prep school in the fall. PHOTO BY JAMES A ESCHER - Williams won the Thorp Award as Nassau County’s best high school football player.
PUBLICATION-TYPE: Newspaper