The Karrases are a Big Ten family. Through three generations, the Karras family has produced seven Big Ten football players, and the latest in the lineage is Illinois’ Teddy Karras.
Teddy’s grandfather and three of his great-uncles started the tradition more than half a century ago. His father and uncle maintained it in the ’80s, and now the spotlight is on Teddy, a redshirt freshman starting at right guard for the Illinois football team.
“I’ve wanted to play in the Big Ten my whole life,” he said. “I love it. It’s a very fickle business. You win, you’re in; you lose, you lose. I’ve learned a lot about life from the game of football.”
Teddy worked for a football scholarship from an early age, but it wasn’t a certainty that he would play football in college, let alone join his family in the Big Ten. His father, Ted Jr., said it wasn’t until Teddy’s junior year at Cathedral High School in Indianapolis, where he won two state titles and earned two all-state honors, that he grew into the player he is today.
“He really started dominating,” Ted Jr. said.
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Teddy received over a dozen scholarship offers and considered schools such as UCLA and Oregon in addition to Big Ten schools: Purdue, Indiana, Northwestern and Illinois. Tradition ultimately won out, and he committed to Ron Zook at Illinois.
“It was a dream come true,” Teddy said. “I was thinking as a kid, I didn’t know what I would do if I didn’t get a D-I scholarship. I was obsessed with it.”
Family tradition
The Karrases are proud of their Big Ten history.
When Tony Karras was being recruited out of Hobart High School in Indiana, he scheduled visits at Ball State and Northern Illinois, but when his father, Ted Karras Sr., found out, the plans changed.
Ted Sr., who played four years at Indiana and won a championship in 1963 with the Chicago Bears, canceled the visits, explaining: “The MAC was created for those who can’t play in the Big Ten. You’re a Big Ten guy from a Big Ten family.” Tony went on to join his brother, Ted Jr., at Northwestern.
“I remember like it was yesterday,” Tony said. “I apologize to all my MAC friends, but we’re Big Ten elitists.”
The first generation of Karras men grew up in Gary, Ind., at a time when recruiting hadn’t yet developed into a national spectacle. The Big Ten was the premier conference in their eyes.
Ted Sr. played at Indiana, his younger brothers Alex and Paul played at Iowa, and his older brother Lou played at Purdue. Ted Sr.’s sons Ted Jr. and Tony played at Northwestern in the ’80s, and Ted Jr.’s son Teddy is currently at Illinois.
“The Big Ten is next to professional football,” said Ted Sr., 77. “That’s the big organization. You get a lot from it when you go and play and get your college degree.”
Although Teddy was born after all of the other six Karras men’s football careers had come to an end, Ann Karras, Ted Sr.’s wife and Teddy’s grandmother, said he still has that same Karras look on the field.
“I might be just in their genes, but they were just good at what they did,” Ann said. “They all have that intensity and they’re very competitive.”
Growing up Big Ten
The seven Karras men not only shared a conference, but they’re also all lineman.
Alex, Tony and Ted Jr. all played defensive line, while Paul, Lou and Teddy are offensive linemen. Ted. Sr. played both at Indiana.
“We come from a bigger family, I guess,” Ted Jr. said, laughing.
He added that their size and ability is likely part genetics but also part upbringing. The Karrases were raised around the game, and while they weren’t pressured to play football, they were certainly trained as athletes from an early age.
They always had football on their minds, and Ted Sr. had Ted Jr. and Tony jumping rope and running on the soft, white sand along Lake Michigan by preschool.
“You’re not always thinking about the training aspects when your dad says go run two miles on the sand or when he puts a jump rope in your hand and tells you go to three minutes, but it’s in you,” Tony said. “It’s your lifestyle, really. It’s your way of life.”
Still, the Karras men insist there was no pressure from family members to play football, though there was certainly pressure from themselves. Seeing the history and the success of the previous generations was motivation enough.
“It was just kind of a given: Males in our family play college football,” Teddy said. “It’s just what I thought you do in my family.”
Maybe more so than any of the other Karras athlete, Teddy grew up with the game. His father coached at St. Xavier University, Rose-Hulman and Marian University, where he is still the head coach. Teddy was around as much as he could be, sitting in the front row for meetings and watching practice.
“Early on he was very aggressive — you could tell he was going to be something,” Tony said.
Teddy didn’t play organized football until third grade, but his father, like his father had done for him, stressed the importance of physical fitness when raising his son. Teddy said he was doing 100 pushups in sets of 10 at age 3, already with college football on his mind.
“My dad would come home and if I didn’t get my pushups in as a football player, he’d get mad at me and tell me someone else was going to take my scholarship,” Teddy said. “It just helped me develop. It’s what my dad had me do, it’s what his dad had him do. It seems to be working.”
Rough patch
Teddy’s first season in the starting lineup hasn’t gone quite as planned.
The Illini are 2-6 coming off a loss to one of the Big Ten’s worst teams in Indiana and are heading into a road matchup with unbeaten Ohio State.
But if Teddy learned anything from the many Karras men who have come before him, it’s that things don’t always go your way in football.
“There’s been great seasons and there’s been terrible seasons,” Teddy said. “You win and you lose. We’ve got to get it right. I go to work every day to try to get better.”
And while Illinois’ right guard often opts to keep things to himself, he isn’t lacking for support through tough times on the field.
“Having played at Northwestern in the ’80s, I can definitely relate to a losing streak,” Tony said. “Every down counts, every down matters, every play is an opportunity. And you have to play every play like it’s your last and let the cards fall where they may.”
All the Karras men who played in the Big Ten played on the lines, and in terms of the Xs and Os of the game, Tony believes the older generations can offer timeless advice to Teddy.
“These kids are a lot bigger, stronger, faster than when we played, but it’s still the same thing,” he said. “You’ve got to be aggressive, you’ve got to play until the whistle blows and pay attention.”
Consequences of the game
On Oct. 10, the Karras men lost one of their own.
Alex Karras, arguably the most accomplished in the family, both for his on-field talent and his off-field career as an actor, passed away.
Alex suffered from dementia for several years before his death and was among 3,500 ex-NFL players engaged in a lawsuit with the league regarding a connection between concussions and brain injuries. Alex’s brother Ted Sr., has been suffering from Alzheimer’s for nearly seven years, and while the disease runs in the family, Ted Sr.’s wife, Ann, said his doctor believes there is likely a connection to his football career.
“I played nine years in the National Football League and my brain doesn’t function really good as far as memory goes,” Ted Sr. said in a phone interview. “But that’s my fault, I guess.”
Despite seeing the consequences a long football career can have later in life, Teddy said he doesn’t worry about the effect playing football can have on him down the road.
“It’s part of the game,” Teddy said. “You get a little window to do what I can do. I’m on borrowed time. I’m 19, the average player plays until he’s about 23, really, and then if you get any time in the NFL, so I’m going to go as hard as I can and not worry about it.”
Teddy said he is fortunate to have never been diagnosed with a concussion and noted that the improved modern helmets are a luxury his grandfather and great-uncles didn’t have while they were playing. ?“I could sit here and worry about it, but that would make me less of a player if I worried about it because, as an o-lineman especially, you use your head every single play,” Teddy said. “I think I was put on earth to play this sport and I want to play it.”
Next in line
Teddy is the seventh Karras man to play in the Big Ten, but the Karras pipeline might not end with him.
Tony’s son Luke Karras is shaping up to be an athlete already at age 4.
“He might be the biggest out of all of us,” Teddy said.
Luke is playing soccer because football isn’t offered at his age yet, but even on the soccer field, his football potential is evident.
“He’s running his soccer player friends over and making them cry because he’s so solid,” Tony said. “I don’t want to put too much pressure on him, but he definitely could be next because he’s fast and can take over a soccer game at his young age.”
Tony jokingly added that he’s thinking about getting Luke ready to start jumping rope and do pushups, but in the Karras family, it’s never too early to start working for a Big Ten scholarship.
Chad can be reached at [email protected] @cthornburg10.