STARKVILLE — With his knee fixed in a brace, Cameron Young sat at home alone, reduced to a spectator.
Fresh off surgery to repair a torn ACL, the Mississippi State redshirt freshman nose tackle had hit a low point. Young’s body had betrayed him. His teammates’ season continued without him. His family had headed home, back to southwest Mississippi, after helping him through the procedure.
So Young was alone in Starkville, rehabbing his knee, watching college football games instead of playing in them.
His mentality? “Man, I’ve got to come back from this,” according to Young’s mother, Tremel Bates-Young.
Nearly three years later, Young has done that and then some.
Used to beating long odds ever since his upbringing, Young got back to full health. He worked his way up the depth chart. He put NFL scouts on notice.
Now a redshirt senior, Young has more to accomplish at Mississippi State.
“Hopefully we see some great things out of him this year,” Bulldogs defensive line coach Jeff Phelps said.
Making it out
Role models in Crosby, Mississippi, are hard to come by.
The town, nestled in the state’s southwest corner, has a population of just 215. According to Young, there’s “really no production” from the place he calls home.
“Growing up in Crosby, it’s really like the trenches, so you’ve really got to get in where you fit in, just try to stay grounded and keep your head on straight,” Young said.
Most people from Crosby drive trucks or work warehouse jobs. Few play college football; even fewer make it to the Southeastern Conference level.
“A lot of guys after me have started going to college, but me growing up, I really didn’t have anybody to look to who was going to college, playing ball, things like that,” Young said.
Young wanted to be different. But at first, he had a different sport in mind.
Basketball was Young’s preferred activity, and he was great. While he hasn’t always been 6-foot-3 and 315 pounds, he was almost always the biggest guy on the court. He was a dominant rebounder who could even shoot 3-pointers capably.
There was just one problem.
“He was very good — if he could stay out of foul trouble,” Bates-Young said.
But football teams took an interest in Young instead. He received his first offer from Jackson State (Bates-Young, an Alcorn State graduate, wasn’t a fan) and decided to pursue football instead.
“He got a football offer, and he was like, ‘OK, well, we’ll just go see what’s going on here,’” Bates-Young said.
The offers kept piling in: Southern Miss, Purdue and schools even farther away. Scouts took notice, constantly taking pictures of Young as he sat on the sideline, impressed by his size.
Then Young received an offer to participate in a Nike skills camp in New Orleans. That, his mother said, “changed everything.”
“Once I took that next step and went to a Nike elite camp, that kind of opened a lot of doors for me,” Young said.
Making the jump
With no high schools within 25 minutes of Crosby, Young spent his prep days at Franklin County, more than a half-hour northeast in Meadville.
There, he showed the talent that made him an SEC recruit — and not just on defense.
Starting in his sophomore season, Young got his chance to play tight end for Franklin County. It didn’t go well — for opposing teams, anyway.
Bates-Young said her son was so big that he scored a touchdown or recorded a first down on practically every catch, simply by reaching over defenders to catch the ball.
“I got a chance to go on the other side of the ball, catch a couple passes, dominate defensive linemen — because you already know what they’re going to do,” Young said.
As a senior, Young’s role on offense was simple: block.
“When I came in the game, you already knew the run was coming behind me,” he said.
But despite the thrill of playing on offense, Young knew where his future lay: at the defensive position he still occupies.
Between his junior and senior years, he racked up 141 tackles, 21 sacks, three fumble recoveries and an interception.
“I don’t think anything’s more fun than playing on the D-line,” Young said. “Sacking the quarterback is just second to none.”
Soon, it came time for Young to decide on his future. He said the choice wasn’t hard.
“I’m a Mississippi kid, so it’s really two choices: Ole Miss or Mississippi State,” he said. “If you’re a dawg, you come to Mississippi State.”
Making it back
Young played just one game in 2018 before redshirting his freshman season, but the next year, he took a slightly bigger role.
He racked up five tackles through the season’s first eight games. But in a 54-24 Mississippi State win at Arkansas on Nov. 2, 2019, disaster struck.
Young was fighting a double-team when defensive end Marquiss Spencer blocked a Razorbacks running back into his leg. Young crumpled, but he felt good enough to walk off the field after a moment.
But when he got to the injury tent on the Bulldogs’ sideline, team trainers confiscated his helmet. He knew something was badly wrong.
“That kind of made it seem that it was bigger than I thought initially,” he said.
Five days after the game, Young underwent surgery in Columbus for a torn ACL.
Teammates who had suffered the same injury knew what he was going through. Their advice helped, but it could only go so far in Young’s recovery.
“Physically, it wasn’t hard because that’s what I expected. That’s what everybody was telling me. I had already prepared myself for it,” he said. “But it was a real challenge mentally trying to tell myself every day that really I’m still in progress and I’ve got to keep going.”
Young took his time coming back.
He made an appearance toward the tail end of fall camp in 2020, reacclimating to SEC football. His debut came on Oct. 31 against Alabama, marking nearly a year without playing a game.
Bates-Young said the injury didn’t affect her son’s quest for a degree from Mississippi State, but it certainly changed how he viewed his playing career.
“As far as the athletic part of it, it just made him want it more,” she said. “I think that it made him want it more. It made him want to be great more.”
Making it count
By 2021, that had become evident.
Young was as low as the third string on the Bulldogs’ depth chart the prior season, coming off the torn ACL and still getting back into the swing of things.
But Phelps saw a player determined to fight for — and win — playing time at nose tackle.
Young improved with every game in 2020, forcing his coaches to take notice.
“He stayed true to the course, kept chipping away and kept just working his way up the depth chart,” Phelps said.
Young sat atop the depth chart last season, starting all 12 games he played in. He totaled 51 tackles — 2.5 for loss — and even grabbed an interception against Kentucky.
Considering his big frame, Young’s ability to move around the field has always stood out.
“He’s gotten more coordinated in understanding his body and what he’s capable of doing with his body, and I think that’s where you see the results showing up on the field,” Phelps said.
Defensive coordinator Zach Arnett called Young, who said he bench-presses more than 400 pounds, the most “physically mature” player on the team, but Young’s maturity extends beyond the football field.
Bates-Young said she trusts her son “a thousand percent,” whether it’s managing money, taking care of business off the field or anything he decides to do. She said Young is a “homebody” who enjoys familiar comforts — her cooking, for example, or shooting pool all night with his father and brother back home.
“It would have to be something very drastic for Cameron to do something out of character,” she said.
Now, Young’s maturity and hard work have him in a strong position. Young heads into his senior season as an NFL draft prospect, with his size giving him a shot at playing professionally.
His mother said that isn’t Young’s ultimate goal, but the two have had conversations about a pro career.
“Cameron lives one day at a time, and I think if that opportunity is afforded to him, that would be great,” Bates-Young said. “He does want to play in the NFL.”
Young still has work to do in Starkville first. He will be eligible through the 2023 season and will remain a leader for the Bulldogs as long as he stays in maroon and white.
And those who helped see him through his lowest point are glad to see him shine.
“It’s awesome to see Cameron do what he loves to do,” Bates-Young said. “… We are proud of him, and it’s just awesome to see him in his element.”
Theo DeRosa reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @Theo_DeRosa.
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