CEDAR CITY, Utah - After four seasons of college football, Tre Caine was certain that his playing career was over. Although he still had one year of eligibility remaining, Caine received his bachelor's degree from UNLV this past May and began to move on from the game of football, taking on a job as a fitness coach at a gym in the Las Vegas area.
After spending time training two college football players in preparation for their pro day, Caine had a change of heart regarding his collegiate career.
"I was helping these guys train to go pro; and, as I was doing that, I thought to myself that I can definitely still do this. I'm not even close to being done yet," said Caine.
He contacted his personal trainer the next day to inform him that he was planning to give football another shot, and he opted to enter his name into the transfer portal.
To his surprise, he received a call from Coach Fitzgerald soon after about joining the Southern Utah football team for the upcoming season. "I was honestly shocked, I didn't really think anything was going to happen, I was just hoping for a shot and as soon as I got one I knew I was going to take it."
What seemed like a surprise to Caine, was quite the opposite for Fitzgerald.
"Watching Tre's film from UNLV was a lot of fun. He's an intelligent football player that plays hard and always finishes plays. That combined with Tre being a graduate transfer made it an easy decision to add him to our football program."
Caine visited Cedar City and the SUU campus shortly after his conversation with Coach Fitzgerald, and he knew immediately that it was where he wanted to finish out what has been a noteworthy and impressive college football career.
"I came out here to visit, and honestly it immediately felt like home to me. Just talking to coach, he made it clear that he wanted me to come here, whereas other times in my career it felt like I had been kind of in the shadows, and I had never been recruited super heavily so talking to coach and just knowing that he wanted me here meant a lot to me."
Caine will play his final season of college football for SUU this fall, but how he finally ended up in Cedar City has been nothing short of an unconventional journey.
Caine is originally from Detroit, Michigan, and he attended University Ligget High School, where he was a standout football player on both offense and defense.
After leading his team to a 10-1 record and rushing for 1,735 yards and 28 touchdowns while also amassing 1,005 receiving yards and 14 receiving touchdowns his senior season, Caine committed to Colgate University as a Wide Receiver, joining the Raider football program in the Fall of 2017.
As a freshman, Caine started in 10 games and finished the year with 15 receptions for 223 yards and three touchdowns. Caine expected to have a breakout sophomore season for the Raiders, but some changes to the coaching staff and other factors led to him seeing a decrease in playing time. At the conclusion of the year, Caine felt like he needed a change of scenery to progress his career, so he entered the transfer portal following the Fall semester of his sophomore year.
After struggling to find a program that Caine felt was the right fit, he decided to move across the country to live with his brother in Las Vegas and enroll in school at UNLV with the intention of walking onto the Rebels' football team.
"I just contacted my brother who was living in the Las Vegas area, and said hey I'm showing up in a couple of days, and I'm going to enroll at UNLV and try to play football, and we went from there."
After playing wide receiver for two seasons at Colgate and not seeing any reps on the defensive side of the ball since high school, Caine began to contemplate whether he should continue to pursue a career as a receiver or revert back to playing defense with the UNLV football program. He ultimately opted to try out as a safety, and he immediately impressed the Rebel coaching staff, earning a spot on the team as a walk-on following tryouts.
"My mindset was that at Colgate I had a bit of a hard time at receiver and that's part of why I didn't play more, so maybe I should try and play safety at UNLV. I actually didn't even tell the coaches there that I had played receiver. I didn't show them any of my film from Colgate, and they had no idea that I was actually an offensive player, I just said that I played safety and obviously it worked out."
Caine made an immediate impact on the UNLV defense as a safety. In the COVID-shortened 2020 season, he saw action in all six contests for the Rebels, compiling 34 total tackles, with three passes defended and one interception. He followed that up by putting together another strong season in 2021, appearing in 11 games on defense and special teams for UNLV.
When asked what the best aspect of his play was, Caine thinks his IQ for the game is what separates him from others.
"I know that I'm not always going to be the fastest or the strongest on the field, but I always take the time to conceptually understand the game, and that really helps me in all aspects. I really focus on paying close attention to the things behind the scenes…what teams tend to do on what downs, and what plays they are most likely to run. I think my football IQ is definitely my strongest aspect."
Caine is now ready to make a strong impact on the SUU defense and put together his best season yet in what will be his last.
Coach Fitzgerald has had the utmost praise for Caine thus far, saying "Tre's work ethic and maturity during our first month of summer workouts have been invaluable. Not only is he getting better each day, but he's also making players around him better."
Caine is excited for the upcoming season, and prepared for the challenges that he and the rest of the SUU football team will face in order to achieve success.
"I'm really focused on having fun and just giving it my all in my last season. We have a lot of talented players, and I know that it's going to be a challenge for all the pieces to come together, but that's a challenge that I signed up for and I think it will be a huge accomplishment to have players come from all over the country and come together and stick together and have a successful season. We all are really excited to turn things around here."
Caine will not only be grinding on the field for the Thunderbirds this Fall but will also be working towards obtaining a Master's Degree in Business Administration in the classroom.
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