The summer before Stanley Primus entered Lincoln H.S., he started playing street football with some neighborhood kids in Coney Island. He impressed some of the older guys so much that they tried to get him to try out for the football team.

“I never really thought about it,” said Primus, now a senior. “I played basketball and figured I would play [that] here.”

Who could blame him? Lincoln has one of the best basketball programs in the city and produced Stephon Marbury.

There was just one small problem – well, maybe “small” isn’t the right word.

“When I met him, he told me he wanted to play basketball,” said Sean O’Connor, Lincoln’s first-year head football coach, who was an assistant at the time. “I told him, ‘You’re not going to play basketball with that body.'”

Primus was then nearly 6-foot-4 and over 300 pounds. With some persuading – and the realization that he wasn’t going to be confused for an NBA prospect – Primus tried out for football having never played in an organized game.

“At first, he was just a big guy out there with no idea what to do,” O’Connor said of Primus, who is now 6-4 and about 325 pounds, depending on whom you ask. “He was just trying to push guys around. Now he’s in much better shape and has good technique. When he first started, you could tell he had the tools to play, but I never expected him to come this far.”

Primus has led the Railsplitters to a surprising 2-0 start in the PSAL after they won just one game last season. Penn State, Michigan State and Syracuse have all contacted him, but Primus needs to improve his SAT score to qualify for the NCAA.

“He still needs to work on technique, lose some weight and get quicker,” O’Connor said. “But I have no doubt he can do those things.”

He has already started. A year ago, Primus topped out at 370 pounds (according to O’Connor) or 350 (according to Primus). Since then, he has dropped about 30 pounds and gained some speed.

“The thing that has stood out to me most about Stanley this year is his pursuit,” O’Connor said. “He’s covering the whole field and catching people.”

Incredibly, at his size, Primus is on the field for every snap. He plays offensive and defensive tackle and on special teams. And although his future is on defense, the play that O’Connor remembers most from this season came on offense.

“We ran this play against Jefferson and after Stanley took care of his guy at the line of scrimmage, he pancaked another guy 20 yards downfield,” O’Connor said. “He’s the reason we’re winning games.”

In addition to pancaking poor defensive backs, Primus has already made 25 tackles.

“This year, I’m going the distance,” Primus said. “Last year, all of us were winded before the half. We weren’t that much worse than other teams last year, they just lasted longer. I wasn’t going to let that happen again.”