Looking out through the small window in his Manley Field House office, game planning for Wake Forest, Tim Lester saw Steve Ishmael and, behind him, a Department of Public Safety officer.

“I was like, ‘Oh my God, what happened to Ish?’” Lester said.

Ishmael wanted to take a shower. The DPS officer said he wanted to make sure Ishmael was allowed to enter the building. Lester said he could, but also asked the wide receiver what he was doing at 11:30 p.m.

He was working out on SU’s practice field.

It was just a late end to another one of his after-practice drill sessions. Those, along with a near-constant stream of questions he fires at his coaches and veteran receivers, have thrust Ishmael onto the field for Syracuse (3-4, 1-2 Atlantic Coast) and into focus as the Orange takes on No. 21 Clemson (5-2, 4-1 ACC) at 7 p.m. on Saturday.

With the Tigers set to blitz freshman quarterback AJ Long with one of the nation’s top pass rushes, Ishmael will have to continue his acceleration as one of SU’s few deep threats.

“If our offensive line can hold them for two and a half, three seconds, I wouldn’t be surprised if Steve can get deep on people,” Long said.

He’s provided many of the highlights of the season for the Orange, making use of the speed and height that he has.

Neither is outstanding, but he’s fine-tuned his game and featured in the Orange’s offense in a way that most freshmen simply don’t. In high school, he skipped his senior prom and a senior “Grad Bash” trip to Universal Studios in Orlando to stay home and work out. Jeff Bertani, his coach at North Miami Beach (Florida) High School coach, said he saw a kid who wasn’t into video games or particularly distracted by girls — just really into football.

“It almost comes off arrogant sometimes because it was, ‘I’m ready to go to the next stage of my life, I’m ready to do this and make a name for myself and all that kind of stuff,’” Bertani said. “But it’s just him, that’s just how he is.”

In Syracuse’s last three games, Ishmael has caught five of the team’s nine catches of more than 15 yards. He has two of the team’s four receiving touchdowns this season and has caught both of Long’s passing touchdowns, both against then-No. 1 Florida State.

“A lot of guys are fast, but don’t know how to use their speed,” junior free safety Durell Eskridge said. “He has decent speed but you would think he’s a 4.3 guy the way he gets on top of you and makes you miss.”

When Ishmael was coming out of eighth grade, a Pop Warner coach told Bertani he wouldn’t have much use for him. Bertani thought he might be too thin and too short. But as a freshman, Ishmael got downfield, jumped to passes at their highest points and caught them.

Four years later his accelerating success downfield is somewhat a product of being targeted more in one-on-one matchups, Lester said.

But he’s also dropped his shoulders and sunken lower into his stance, making it harder for opposing defensive backs to hold him up at the line of scrimmage. When he lines up against Clemson — either as an X or a Z receiver, in the slot or on the line — he won’t have time to be held up. The Tigers’ pass rush is too good.

Earlier in the season, he couldn’t. He had to get off the line first. In high school, nobody bothered to press cover him, Bertani said.

Lester remembers one play against Notre Dame when Ishmael was “manhandled” at the line by a Notre Dame defender.

But two weeks later he burned FSU for a pair of touchdown catches. The questions to senior receiver Jarrod West — “J-West are you going to watch film today, J-West how do you get open on that route, J-West how do you do this?” — kept coming.

Ishmael had quizzed West about what led to the senior’s 51-yard reception against Maryland down to the grab of his defender’s shoulder pad. West laughs when he thinks about the amount of questions he’s fielded from Ishmael.

Since he’s arrived on campus, they haven’t really stopped — through extra routes with quarterbacks after practice, sessions with the ball machine or ladder circuits all by himself.

On Saturday night SU will be playing in front of 81,000 mostly hostile fans and against the nation’s 17th-best pass defense. And the Orange will be looking for Ishmael.

Said fellow freshman receiver Jamal Custis: “He saw a chance to play early and he wasn’t going to let nothing stop him.”

Published on October 23, 2014 at 12:12 am

Contact Jacob: jmklinge@syr.edu | @Jacob_Klinger_