High school football: Why Trotwood-Madison QB chose Indiana

He is also looking forward to running IU’s version of the spread offense because it reminds him of Trotwood’s wide-open attack.

“Oh, yeah it fits me perfectly, the scheme,” Carpenter said in an interview. “It fits me perfectly.”

Although he likes playing fast, Carpenter’s recruitment went a bit more slowly.

As the starting quarterback for one of Ohio’s more prominent teams, he was a known commodity on the recruiting circuit last summer prior to his junior season.

He gathered interest and went through the process of learning about potential college destinations through the year then saw things pick up this spring.

“The process started off cool and it was very I would say friendly,” Carpenter said. “Like it was nice getting offers and all that attention about that, but when it was time for me to buckle down and make a decision, that’s when it turned stressful because you had to take a lot of things into consideration to pick a school. That’s the part that made it stressful.”

Akron, Bowling Green, Marshall and Ball State were also in the running, but Carpenter settled on Indiana after getting to know IU offensive coordinator Walt Bell, who got his attention in a perhaps curious way.

Bell told Carpenter he hadn’t been good enough to play for the Hoosiers when the coach first saw him.

“I just appreciated the honesty out of him, and he said the way that I’ve grown over the year since he’d seen me, from the beginning to now, was amazing,” Carpenter said. “He said he didn’t think that I could grow as much as I did.

“It was an instant click.”

Carpenter is a fan of IU head coach Tom Allen, too.

“He’s amazing,” Carpenter said of the 30-year coach who has had his share of pre- or post-game speeches go viral for their enthusiasm. “You know, he’s very inspiring, and he’s always fired up. He’s positive. and he does what he says. A lot of coaches will try to sell you stuff and they don’t actually mean it, but whatever coach Allen says, he means it and he’s just amazing.”

Carpenter is happy he could get his decision out of the way so he can try to assist in Indiana’s efforts to build their 2024 recruiting class.

That has become common for quarterbacks, and being a leader is something he’s already familiar with.

A Trotwood roster that was talented but young started slowly last season, losing four of their first five, but they finished strong.

The Rams won their last five regular season games then beat Chaminade Julienne in the first round of the playoffs before falling to a powerful Tippecanoe team in the second round.

Carpenter has many of his top weapons back for another run this season, and he feels they can build off the momentum of the second half of the ‘22 campaign.

“Oh, yeah because last year, we had a couple learning curves in the game,” he said. “I think it just came from everyone. I don’t like to make excuses, but we kind of got thrown into the fire at an early age, so now I feel like we started to get the groove of things.”

He has felt that in seven on sevens this summer even if he acknowledges those competitions aren’t the same as a real game.

“I don’t like them as much, but I can tell by the way we move, the way we operate,” Carpenter said. “It’s a lot smoother, and this momentum is gonna carry into the season where I feel like we’ll be a lot better than we were last year.”