Casey Fitzgerald- Article

mgsteve · July 22, 2008

From fast food to fast track, UNT receiver still has a grip

NEW ORLEANS — If you can question one thing about Casey Fitzgerald, it’s his menu choice in a town full of eclectic native cuisine.

At Serio’s Po-Boys and Deli, one of the city’s stalwart eateries, the North Texas Mean Green’s senior receiver steps up to the lunch counter and orders ... a grilled chicken sandwich. With ketchup and mustard.

This is tantamount to ordering pork at Del Frisco’s steak house, but Fitzgerald doesn’t second-guess his choice. A lunch companion offers him half of his muffaletta, Serio’s signature sandwich.

"I don’t think so," Fitzgerald says with a grimace, recoiling from the sandwich’s oil-soaked olive relish.

For one of the Sun Belt Conference’s most glamorous offensive players, Fitzgerald is refreshingly unglamorous. His path to stardom is so humble and ordinary, yet so unlikely.

After flipping burgers for years to help pay for college, he’s with UNT coach Todd Dodge at the Sun Belt Conference media days this week.

"I was just excited about the opportunity to get on the field and show what I could do," Fitzgerald said of being unearthed by a new UNT coaching staff last year, when he had 111 catches and 12 touchdowns.

Named to the 2008 preseason all-conference team, Fitzgerald played little in two years at UNT after walking on from Red Oak High, where he was an outstanding but unrecruited basketball player.

He showed promise in football in 2006 on then-coach Darrell Dickey’s "Green Team," walk-ons and roster stragglers Dickey used in games to light a fire under the regular offense.

Not until Dodge and new receivers coach Clayton George put a fresh set of eyes on Fitzgerald did he flourish. He was working a longtime job at Whataburger to help pay for rent, books and other incidentals while his mother, a special-education teacher, paid his tuition.

"I didn’t know until recently that he wasn’t even a preferred walk-on," Dodge said. "He went through a tryout in the fall of 2004 to walk on the spring of 2005. There were 30 to start out, and he’s one of two guys left."

Grateful for a scholarship awarded in August, Fitzgerald soared on the field and never wavered in class. He plans to be a student teacher in Lake Dallas this spring in preparation for a high school coaching/teaching career.

He’s still at Whataburger part time, but his last day is Sunday. He’s a rarity; a working college student who takes pride in a means-to-an-ends job, even one in fast food.

"Any job builds character," said Fitzgerald, who can man a grill of 30 burgers at a time. "It’s taught me responsibility and prepared me for my real job some day. In fast food, you’ve got to have patience and deal with all kinds of customers and situations. Maybe, one day, I’ll buy one of those places."

The middle of three brothers, Fitzgerald will be the second to graduate college. Older brother Johnny played for SMU, and younger brother Tony is a junior at Texas. Football glory is nice, but Casey comes from a family that values education. Being 5-foot-11, that’s a good idea.

"I have to take care of other things," he said, referring to any pro football prospects he might have. "You can’t depend all on one thing happening like that."

That safe/smart approach works for someone who runs routes and catches passes like he’s out of his mind. True to his nature, the only seafood he’ll touch in New Orleans is plain ol’ fried catfish.

"None of that weird stuff," he said.