Nicholas Cross is an American football player who was recently drafted by the Indianapolis Colts. Cross was born on September 10, 2001 and grew up in Bowie. He attended St. Jerome Academy during his middle school years. For high school, he chose to attend DeMatha Catholic High School and pursue a football career.

He came to DeMatha with little football experience. Head JV football coach and varsity defensive analyst Lawrence Waters ’83 said, “When he showed up [to DeMatha] he didn’t even know how to tackle.” Football wasn’t the only sport Cross played; he also ran on the track team and competed in the 60m, 200m, and the 4x100m and 4x200m relays.

With Cross’s dedication and hard work, he started to excel in both. One of his teammates said, “He was always the first one [to practice] and last one to leave.” He was rated a 4-star recruit and had multiple Division 1 scholarship offers for football. Originally he committed to Florida State University, but changed his mind and chose to attend the University of Maryland after graduating from DeMatha in 2019. As a Terp, he started 21 of 29 games and had stats that impressed NFL scouts. By the end of his junior season he had NFL teams interested in him and decided to forgo his senior season and declare for the draft.

He had an impressive performance at the combine and looked NFL-ready to all the teams watching him. He ended up getting drafted 96th overall in the third round by the Indianapolis Colts. With an impressive preseason performance, he was named the starting strong safety, lined up next to fellow DeMatha alum and Super Bowl champion Rodney McLeod ’08. Their first regular season game ended in a tie against the Houston Texans and Cross recorded four tackles to start off the year. Nick Cross certainly has a bright future and has all of DeMatha is rooting him on.