Demopolis High School quarterback Rick Boone officially received an invite this week to play in the North-South All-Star Game July 17 at Lewis Crews Stadium in Huntsville.

“It’s a tremendous honor for Rick to be playing in the game,” DHS head coach Tom Causey, who will serve as an assistant on the South squad, said. “It’s a tremendous honor for Demopolis High School.”

For Boone, the honor was as much of a surprise as receiving the scholarship offer that will allow him to continue his playing career at the University of West Alabama.

“It means a lot,” Boone said of the selection. “Everything happens that you wouldn’t expect to happen. We were seconds away from the semi-finals. Then I got offered a football scholarship. Now I get invited to play in the North-South All-Star Game.”

On the South squad, the UWA signee will be at the helm of an option offense that operates out of the pistol, an attack that is not entirely unlike the spread Boone quarterbacked at Demopolis.

“He just said the South runs a spread offense and asked me if I was up for it,” Boone said of a conversation he had with Causey in which the signal-caller informed the DHS head coach he indeed felt up for the challenge. “He said I had the combination of the arm and the legs (to run the option).”

When he arrives on the campus of Alabama A&M, Boone will play his final high school game under South head coach Fred Riley, who also leads the program at Davidson High.

“Me coaching in the game didn’t have any influence over (Boone’s selection). Fred Riley, our head coach, is coaching quarterbacks and selected his players,” Causey said. “Rick made that on his own.”

The game also affords Boone, who passed for 1,434 yards and 18 touchdowns while running for 708 yards and nine scores during his senior season, the opportunity to get in one more game before beginning his collegiate playing career.

“I see no point in playing if you’re not going to play to win,” Boone said of the opportunity. “But seeing as how it is my last game before I start college ball, I want to go out with a bang.”

“There’s no doubt in my mind that Rick will go up to Huntsville and he’ll represent the city of Demopolis with the same character with which he’s represented Demopolis High School for the last four years.”