Rich Muraco doesn’t just talk about Troy Fautanu. He raves about him. And to Muraco, the head football coach at Liberty High School in Las Vegas, you can’t separate Fautanu the player from Fautanu the person – dichotomous as they are – when highlighting what makes him special.
“Troy’s a coach’s dream,” said Muraco, who coached the Pittsburgh Steelers’ 2024 first-round draft pick for four seasons at Liberty. “He always did the right thing off the field. Teachers loved him. Was well-liked by the student body. Never got in trouble. But he knew how to flip that switch when he started playing to play nasty and play physical and enjoy that side of football.