Oct. 29, 2017
By Trevian Smith
AuburnTigers.com
AUBURN, Ala. - After years of playing sports, Pete Berryman originally focused on being a college student.
"I honestly didn't come to Auburn with intentions of playing sports," said Berryman, a senior tight end from Birmingham. "I was really coming just to be a student, but pretty quickly when I got here, I realized that I didn't just want to go to school."
A two-time state champion in basketball, Berryman was versatile, excelling in multiple sports instead of choosing just one at Mountain Brook High School.
"I tried to play all the sports in high school. I never really wanted to specialize in any of them because I liked them all," Berryman said. "I know there are advantages to specializing in certain ones, but my mindset in high school was to play everything that I can for as long as I can."
Berryman, who is on track to graduate in May in industrial and systems engineering with a minor in Spanish, chose to attend Auburn because of its great reputation and engineering program.
During his freshman and sophomore years at Auburn, Berryman was involved in intramural sports such as flag football and basketball. Competing for a t-shirt that says "Champions" on it with friends was fun, but Berryman knew something was missing.
"It just wasn't quite enough," Berryman said. "I missed sports because that's all I did in high school and growing up. I also wanted to have a little more purpose with my time and that's what led me to where I am now."
Intramural sports lit a fire inside of Berryman that led him to try out for the baseball team in the fall of his sophomore year. He didn't make it, but his confidence remained undiminished.
"I was like, 'Well, what's next?'"
Auburn football was a logical choice for Berryman, who was bigger than he was in high school and had a friend, Austin Dupper, who walked on to the football team.
Not knowing what would be asked of him, Berryman focused on being in top shape and letting everything else take care of itself.
"I definitely trained before the tryout -- working out and running a lot -- but in terms of actual football skills, I didn't really do much leading into the tryout," Berryman said. "I really was just trying to get myself into as good of a shape as possible."
Berryman saw playing football at Auburn as an opportunity to grow and develop a better work ethic.
"I think honestly, my grades are better now that I do have more constraints on my time," said Berryman, who earned Academic Top Tiger recognition last spring. "I just know that at night, I go to bed feeling so much better about what I've done on a certain day because I know how much of a challenge football is and how much it pushes me to be a better person and better athlete. I've learned so many lessons from it; it's been really great."
The past four years at Auburn have left Berryman with many memories, none more cherished than the Saturdays he gets to run out of the tunnel wearing orange and blue.
"Saturdays in Jordan-Hare Stadium," he said. "That's an experience. There's no way that I could ever forget it and there's nothing that I could ever compare it to."
Trevian Smith is a student assistant in Auburn athletics communications