MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Spring Valley High School product Doug Nester had a decision to make regarding his future following last season.
Would he return to WVU? Would he attempt to make a career at the pro level? Or would he stop playing football altogether?
Ultimately, he decided to return to West Virginia for a fifth season of college football.
“[I] just had to talk it over with my family, talk it over with the coaches, and really just see what was the best option for me,” Nester said Thursday. “Talking it out with them, I mean, it was just an easy decision that I should come back.”
According to the offensive lineman, conversations with those around him were the largest determining factor in his decision. The ability to return to school, and continue to improve on the field, was an added bonus.
When going through his decision-making process, Nester was “re-recruited” by WVU in a sense. While giving him information, the coaching staff also had to pitch returning to Morgantown to the veteran lineman. A former four-star recruit out of Wayne County, Nester has been recruited plenty of times before — first successfully by Virginia Tech out of high school, and then successfully by West Virginia two years later when he decided to transfer.
“Yeah, it was a little bit of convincing,” said Nester. “It was really just them being honest with me. I asked them for honesty — what they thought, where I would go, anything like that. And then just having deep conversations with them, whether or not I should come back. That’s all I wanted was honesty.”
While returning to WVU or going pro were seemingly the only two choices that Nester heavily considered, he did offer that stepping away from the game entered his mind.
“This will be my fifth year of actually playing [college football], so I was kind of to the point where I was almost done,” Nester said.
Based on Nester’s comments Thursday, he did not seek direct advice from those at the next level about his potential for this year. Nor does it seem he asked now-former teammates Dante Stills or Bryce Ford-Wheaton for their input. Instead, Nester’s conversations stayed between him, Neal Brown, and his parents.
Nester traded one transition for another.
Instead of transitioning from being a college football player to whatever he would’ve done next, the offensive lineman is transitioning to being WVU’s right tackle.