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Georgia Bulldogs running back Nate Frazier couldn’t help but laugh when he reminisced about his first time getting a handoff in college last season.
The true freshman out of Compton, California, didn’t expect he would be hearing his name called against No. 14 Clemson, but nonetheless, head coach Kirby Smart wanted him on the field.
“There’s been people at the University of Georgia for three years and haven’t even touched the field yet,” he told Fox News Digital over the phone while discussing his partnership with Powerade’s “It Takes More” campaign. “So, it’s like I wasn’t really expecting myself to touch the field.
“My heart was beating out of my chest and I couldn’t even feel my body. I was so nervous.”
Frazier said that first handoff led to him tripping “because I couldn’t feel my feet.” But Frazier knew he had to face all the noise, expectation and nerves that come with playing SEC football.
Why? His mother wouldn’t have it any other way.
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Frazier described his mother, Yomeisha Moore, as his “biggest hero.”
She raised him as a single mother through the first years of his life, depending on her own mother and sisters to help raise her only son. And her son never forgets what she’s done to help him reach this point to now – being atop the Bulldogs’ depth chart at running back entering the 2025 season.
“Her determination and work ethic made me feel like I had no choice – I can’t give up,” Frazier explained when asked about his mother’s influence. “No matter what comes my way, there’s no backing out because I literally watched her do it. No matter what came her way, she never backed out. She never quit, she never gave up. She always found her way out.
“My mother never, ever in her life told me, ‘Son, I can’t do this.’ My mother has always made a way for me no matter what it was. No matter if you had a meteor coming down from the sky, my mom would be able to work it out and be able to protect me.”
That drive from Moore stuck with Frazier, who picked himself up after that first carry against Clemson and rushed for 83 yards with a touchdown on 11 carries in the 34-3 blowout to open the 2024 season.
Frazier went on to rush for 671 yards on 133 attempts with eight rushing touchdowns in his debut season for the Bulldogs, cementing himself as a piece for the future on Smart’s squad.
The stakes are higher for Frazier this year, even if he isn’t eligible to enter the NFL Draft just yet. That will have to wait for next year, but he’s not even thinking about his own future. He is team-focused, saying that he just wants to do what’s best for the Bulldogs in 2025 to hopefully make it further than just winning the SEC Championship like they did last season.
But Frazier plays for much more than just the Bulldogs and their faithful fans in Athens every week. Over 2,000 miles away, his mother is watching in suspense, hoping her son continues to never give up despite the situation. And so are young ones wanting to be Frazier some day.
“I play for all the kids back home no matter where they’re at,” Frazier began when asked who he plays for each game day. “Not even my hometown, but for kids that don’t believe they can do it and just think it’s impossible and unheard of. I play for all the kids that grew up in the type of situations I grew up in, where majority of the stuff is the street life and stuff like that. I play for all the kids that need to know that there is other options. This option that you choose, the athlete way, whether it’s playing football, running track or whatever you’re doing, it can work.
“I play for my family. Every time there’s hard times or hard points [of the season], I just think about my family and all the struggles we went through and stuff like that. They never gave up on me and were always in my corner, always in my circle. They were positive to me no matter what it was.”
Frazier and the Bulldogs begin their 2025 football journey on Saturday, where they will host Marshall at Sanford Stadium.
FRAZIER KNOWS IT TAKES MORE
Frazier’s emergence as a key cog for the Bulldogs’ football program means opening up new NIL opportunities, which came as Powerade refreshed the “It Takes More” campaign, which enters its third straight year ahead of the college football season.
“I never really thought I’d be able to have opportunities like this to be able to be in this position,” he told FOX Business. “Powerade is a drink that’s used by athletes around the world, not even the country. To be able to be in this position is amazing, and it doesn’t feel real. I’m just really blessed to be able to work with Powerade.”
As a true freshman last season playing in the SEC, the hardest conference in college football, Frazier truly understood the meaning of “It Takes More.”
“It takes extra hours of film. It takes extra hours being with your coach. It takes extra hours of field work. It takes more studying of the playbook. It takes more studying of the team you’re going to play against. …All the things you think you need to work on, dive more into it,” he said.
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