6/18/2017 football Edit

Javon Terry: I Love Everything About The Tar Heels

3-Star safety Javon Terry was relieved Saturday night to get the recruiting process over with by committing to UNC. (Bruce Young, THI)

Andrew Jones • TarHeelIllustrated

Publisher

Andrew Jones has covered sports for 26 years, including all major college & professional sports for daily newspapers & national sites. He's done radio and TV & is entering his seventh year at THI.

Javon Terry was all smiles Saturday night.

The 3-star safety from Wake Forest (NC) High School was relieved the grind of the recruiting process was finally behind him. He committed to North Carolina following The annual Freak Show event at Kenan Stadium, and was finally able to let out a gigantic exhale.

“It feels great to get it off my chest, I feel good…,” Terry told THI. “Everything has been a grind – work hard in school, football, everything.”

No more recruiting, no more worrying about any of that stuff, right?

“Yeah, I’m shutting it down,” he replied.

Terry, who is 6-2 and 185 pounds, is rated the No. 33 overall prospect in the state of North Carolina for the class of 2018, will join former Wake Forest teammate Xach Gill in Chapel Hill. Gill, a 4-star 2017 defensive lineman, enrolled this past January. Did Gill being a Tar Heel have any impact on Terry’s decision?

“A little bit because I like how he did everything,” Terry said. “He came here to be a Tar Heel and I just like the campus, I love everything about the Tar Heels.”

Being local, Terry has been to UNC around five times, he said, and chose the Heels over mainly Wake Forest, though N.C. State and East Carolina have also offered.

As much as Terry loves UNC and wanted to be a Tar Heel, he didn’t make up his mind about where he wanted to go to school really until he arrived for the Freak Show.

“When I came to camp I told the coaches I was going to be a Tar Heel,” he said.

Just like that, Terry made up his mind. Well, not exactly just like that. It had been brewing for a while.

“I just like how they take care of everything,” he said. “They take care of academics, football, off the field and how they take care of the players.”

Terry says he’s going to try and graduate early, but has a lot of work to do in order for that to happen. As for football, he has a couple of things in mind to fine tune before heading off to college.

“I think I’m going to work more on my technique and footwork,” Terry said. “And then everything should be good after that and then I’ll work on being a Tar Heel.”