All-Metro football defensive player of the year: Burks leaves an unprecedented legacy at Cardinal Ritter
Cardinal Ritter senior safety Marvin Burks Jr. is the Post-Dispatch All-Metro football defensive player of the year.
The first time Marvin Burks Jr. stepped on the field as a freshman his name was not his own.
He made his debut at safety for the Cardinal Ritter football team against Nazareth Academy in suburban Chicago. The Roadrunners were led by future NFL draft pick and current Michigan quarterback J.J. McCarthy. Burks made an interception that game, but his name didn’t ring out over the public address system when he did.
Ritter’s old coaching staff changed up the roster and gave Burks’ name to an ineligible player who ran wild at running back in what was at the time a statement win for the Lions.
“I was so locked in on the game they were saying Marvin Burks and I wasn’t thinking too much of it,” Burks said.
On Wednesday he signed to continue his academic and athletic career at the University of Missouri, where he will enroll in January.
Burks and teammate Fredrick Moore are the first students to graduate Ritter early. In order to do so, both took additional classes online during the recently completed semester while also fulfilling their Christian service-hours requirement.
