Senior beats cancer, commits to play college football at North Alabama

GULF SHORES, Ala. (WKRG) — Gulf Shores High School senior Tyler Burkett is living his football dream. He signed on the dotted line Wednesday, committing to play the game he loves for the University of North Alabama.

“It feels great,” Burkett said at his signing day ceremony at Gulf Shores High School. “This is the best feeling in the world. After everything that has happened, this is what I needed.”

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To appreciate this accomplishment, you have to go back to last year.

“From January of 2024 to about four or five months ago, it’s just a blur,” Burkett said.

That is because he was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma shortly after helping lead the Dolphins to a state football championship. What followed was six months of chemotherapy. All he could do was hope he would be able to play again at the start of his senior season.

That didn’t happen. Scans showed the cancer was still there, and more treatments would be needed.

“I feel like maybe it was God telling me I’m getting a little ahead of myself,” Burkett said. “When I got that reality check, it really made me worry about the next day.”

Now he is cancer-free, and that dream of playing college ball is a little more in focus.

“This is what got him up and kept him going through the chemos and all the treatment,” said Gulf Shores head football coach Mark Hudspeth. “The dream of playing college football, and now to see it come to fruition is pretty special.”

“I have my boy back, No. 74!”

The rest of the world now realizes what his mom, Jessica Burkett, already knew.

“He is amazing,” Jessica Burkett said. “He is the strongest person I know. He is a great kid.”

A survivor, soon to be a high school graduate, and then on to college.

“They are going to get somebody that works as hard as possible and going to get somebody that doesn’t give up,” Tyler Burkett said. “You are not going to get a quitter out of me.”