Athlete of the Week: Welcome to the Ethan Greenwood show

By Mike Voltaggio, STAFF WRITER

The fall season is in full swing and so is the 2024 campaign for the LIU Sharks football team. As the leaves fall and welcome a new season with a change of scenery outside, the Sharks have had some changes of their own heading into conference action in the Northeast conference (NEC). Ethan Greenwood, who served as the backup quarterback to start the season, was promoted to starter by Head Coach Ron Cooper and Co-Offensive Coordinators Kort Shankweiler and John Roberts.

This isn’t the first time that Greenwood has seen action for the Sharks however, during the 2023 season Greenwood found himself in a quarterback rotation with then-true freshman Chris Howell after Stanzani found himself sidelined with an injury. Greenwood detailed the experience and his takeaways from that season.

“Filling that role for Luca was definitely difficult and there were some big shoes to fill,” Greenwood said. “However, that experience did help me learn the offense better as well as helped me gain experience with playing at a college level. I enjoyed being in rotation with Chris and we had plays designed for me and plays designed for him.”

Things were looking up for Greenwood in his first season as a Shark, as he made his first collegiate start against Maine last season before going down with an injury that would sideline him for the rest of the year.

“When I went down last season, Chris did a great job of taking the torch and doing what he had to do,” Greenwood states. “I had a herniated disc and torn muscles on both sides of my groin. I needed surgery and it was about a four-month recovery before I could get back into action, but in the meantime, I just had to take things slow.”

The injury would not slow Greenwood down heading into the 2024 season. The redshirt sophomore would find himself in a familiar role as a change-of-pace option quarterback for LIU to start the campaign. Things would take a drastic turn for Greenwood though, as entering week six and beginning conference play for the Sharks, Greenwood would be handed the keys to the offense during in the second quarter in LIU’s loss against the Dukes of Duquesne University.

“[The coaching staff] told me around the beginning of the second quarter that I would be running the offense,” Greenwood states. “I guess they just thought that things weren’t gelling right out there so I guess they felt they needed to switch things up, so they had told me that I was going to be playing the rest of the game. I knew I had to try and do something special to help us get back into the game. It was a tough loss but we did what we could.”

In spite of the loss, Greenwood would prove himself to be a more than competent quarterback. He finished the contest with 9 completions on 16 attempts for 179 yards and 2 touchdowns along with his 9 rushing attempts for 50 yards on the ground as well.

Greenwood details how he was able to have such a solid game against a Duquesne team that holds the top spot in the Northeast Conference.

“It was definitely a team effort. I can’t thank my offensive line enough, they gave me time in the pocket to make the right decisions and my receivers do a great job of making me look good. They’re super athletic and able to make some great plays, so it makes my job easy.”

After the Sharks’ tough week 6 loss to conference opponent Duquesne, the winless LIU were looking to right the ship headed into their week 7 matchup against the Stonehill Skyhawks.

“The spirits in the locker room have definitely been up as opposed to previous weeks,” Greenwood said. “I feel like this is going to be a different game from past games we’ve played. We should almost definitely come out with a win. We know Stonehill is a gritty team, they’re very disciplined, they do their proper jobs and they do them well so we know that it’s going to be a tough fight but one I know that we can win.”

A win is exactly what the Sharks would acquire and on the back of a phenomenal ground game led by none other than Greenwood himself, as he amassed 186 rushing yards on 26 attempts with 1 touchdown to go along with his 57 yards through the air and a passing touchdown as well to lead his team to a 31-7 victory over the Skyhawks and notch the Sharks first tally in the win column on the year. Greenwood was awarded NEC Offensive Player of the Week for his efforts.

Off the back of an incredible quarterback performance by Greenwood, the Sharks would find themselves in a back-and-forth matchup against their week 8 opponents The Robert Morris Colonials. It was an exciting game throughout but an unfortunate outcome for the Sharks as they weren’t quite able to edge out the Colonials down the home stretch of the fourth quarter falling 45-31. Greenwood would solidify himself as the new starter of this Sharks team replicating his success from the week prior, amassing 222 passing yards on 13 completions with 1 touchdown and 193 yards on the ground on 26 rushing attempts in the loss.

Greenwood is a Long Island native from Baldwin and a graduate of Kellenberg Memorial High School originally attended The Citadel, a military school in South Carolina, where he spent one year as a Bulldog before searching for another home while in the transfer portal.

Greenwood spoke on his beginnings in football and what led him to become a Shark

“I grew up playing football, I have been playing since I was seven. When I got to High School I was obviously on J.V. until I got to 11th grade where I then played varsity. The COVID year was rough as that was during my Junior year and I really didn’t get to play much then. Senior year went really well though, and that is when I picked up an offer from the Citadel and Valparaiso. I chose the Citadel because of the structure factor. The coaching staff was very welcoming when I took my official visit and they were giving me everything I was looking for in a college. My freshman year there I redshirted and didn’t get to see the field much so I decided to enter the transfer portal the December of that year after the season, I was waiting around for a while and then Coach John Roberts from LIU had messaged me on twitter, he told me he would love to see me workout so I threw a little bit for him and showed him and Coach Shankweiler what I could do. After that workout, I then had a meeting with them and Coach Cooper and they liked what they saw so they decided to offer me and it didn’t take me very long to commit to LIU because it checked all the boxes for me, one of the big ones being that it was close to home so my family could come and watch me play and my mother like that I was so close.”

With Greenwood now being the full-time starter for the Sharks and a lot of his football career still left to be played, LIU hopes that Greenwood will be a key piece to helping this team secure their first-ever NEC championship.