The 2009 Pacific Islands Athletic Alliance (PIAA) Combine on May 30th at Saint Louis High School in Honolulu, Hawai’i, saw Australian Gridiron player, Blake Muir, of the Sutherland Seahawks in NSW, compete along side the best Hawaiian high school football players; a show case of talent all striving to be noticed by college recruiting coaches.

PIAA is a non-profit organization, sponsored in part by the NFL, that provides recruiting services to primarily Hawaiian based high school athletes in their goal of achieving a scholarship offer, particularly for football, but for other sports as well. PIAA has existed since 2001 and this year was their 8th Combine.

Hawai’i is a state known for producing some of the best football talent in the country. Last year’s consensus #1 recruit in the nation was Punahou Linebacker Manti Te’o, who signed a letter of intent with Notre Dame.

Blake, only started training and playing Gridiron in mid 2008, and was immediately identified as a talented prospect by Sutherland Seahawks Head Coach Peter Upham, who had prepared current University of Hawai’i Offensive Lineman Adrian Thomas for his career in a Division One college program.

Blake’s dedication to training paid off with excellent results at the Combine as seen below.

• Height: 6’5” ½
• Weight: 246lb
• Hand: 9.5”
• Reach: 33”
• 10 yard: 1.63sec
• 40 yard: 4.88sec
• Vert: 33”
• T-test: 4.49sec
• 185lb Bench: 16 reps

These are excellent numbers, all the more impressive considering the travel involved in attending the event; it placed him amongst the top of his Defensive Lineman group that included players who already have scholarship offers from Oregon, Oregon State, Hawai’i, BYU, Arizona, Washington, Colorado and Stanford.

Blake now has to follow up recruiting leads with the coaches he has established contact with at Hawai’i, Georgia Tech, Southern Miss, SMU, Colorado, Idaho, Northern Arizona and Idaho State.

THE LEAD UP.

Blake has been training at new workout facility, Shire Speed and Strength, run by Sutherland Seahawks coach Peter Upham. Since November 2008, Blake has added 12.5kg of body weight and dropped 2.5% body fat. His 40 yard dash time has dropped by 0.2 of a second, an all important indicator of objective power athleticism, and certainly seen, rightly or wrongly, as the gold standard of measurements in the football combine world.

Blake graduated from Kirrawee High school in December and took the SAT exam on May 2nd. A past National title medallist in swimming as well as an excellent Aussie Rules player, Blake adapted to Gridiron very quickly, leading the 2009 Seahawks Colts team in sacks, tackles and tackles for loss from the Defensive Line spot in his first football season.

THE EVENT.

Attending the event was Blake, his father Phillip and Coach Peter Upham. Departing on Wednesday the 27th it allowed Blake two days to recover before performing on the Saturday. On Thursday they toured the University of Hawai’i facilities and talked to coaches Rich Miano, George Lumpkin and Dave Aranda who now have legitimate objective testing results to go with his game film and high school transcripts.

The PIAA Combine was attended by 275 athletes from all over the Hawaiian Islands. Arriving at 7am in the morning, every athlete had to be registered, weighed and measured. Late May is getting hot in Honolulu, a sea breeze helped but the on field temperature was 31 degrees and the day lasted till 2.30pm.

The mass of participants was divided into 8 groups, mostly by position and for Blake that meant competing alongside the top Defensive Line prospects in the state. For players not just at that position, but for the whole combine, over 210lb, Blake had the 2nd and 3rd fastest 40 yard, 10 yard and T-test times.

GETTING NOTICED.

Blake’s standout performances quickly attracted the attention of reporters and Blake was interviewed by local beat writers as well as for Scouts.com where he will appear on their subscription recruiting website.

Locally, in the next two weeks, several media outlets are interested in the story that ties in with the up coming Junior season campaign of University of Hawai’i lineman Adrian Thomas, a fellow Sutherland Seahawks club member who is back in town between semesters.