BRADENTON, Fla. — The sun had not yet set last Friday on a field ringed by palm trees when, on the first play from scrimmage, Shea Patterson rolled to his left and threw a 69-yard touchdown pass for his high school, IMG Academy, a private, for-profit sports boarding school.
On the academy’s campus, a onetime tomato farm, the latest experiment in prep football is taking root and could produce, depending on one’s view, bountiful harvests of talent or a blight of professionalism. Coaches and officials around the country are watching with curiosity and wariness.
Patterson, who is considered the nation’s top high school quarterback, threw the scoring pass to receiver Drake Davis, a national indoor sprinting champion.