Durrell Turner from Simon Kenton a tough hombre in his own right- @rell_turner1 @minguabeefjerky @840WHAS @SKHSFootball @1776Bank @KyHighFootball @MaxPreps

’25 RB led 6A in rushing and proved valuable in other phases

Durrell Turner is a 5’7,” 170 pound burst of power, explosion, and production. To say he is one of the premier running backs playing in the KHSAA today is an understatement. Coming into his senior year, one has to wonder how far he can take this final charge up the preverbal hill? Is he a Mr. Football candidate? Should he be?

HB Lyon, Scouting Director, KPGFootball

Previous article about Durrell Turner

Hudl Page

Durrell Turner is a rough, tough customer. Perhaps it is fate which brought him to play his high school career at Simon Kenton. Well, fate and geography we suppose.

It always interests me concerning the men for whom a district elects to name a school. Simon Kenton, the man for whom Independence, Kentucky elected to christen its high school, was an interesting guy by all accounts.

Simon Kenton was a legendary frontiersman in Ohio and the Midwest. He was born on April 3, 1755, in Fauquier County, Virginia. He grew up helping his father on the family farm and therefore had little opportunity to go to school. 

At the age of sixteen, Kenton became involved in a fight involving a woman. Believing he had killed a man, he fled to the Ohio Country where he changed his name to Simon Butler.

In 1782, Kenton would discover the man he believed he had killed had actually lived. Therefore, Simon was able to resume his family name of “Kenton” abandoning “Butler.”

Kenton spent the next two years hunting along the Ohio River. In 1774, he served as a scout during Lord Dunmore’s War. 

By 1775, Kenton had moved to Boonesborough, Kentucky. For the next few years, he worked as a scout for the settlement, often coming in contact with the local Native Americans. At one point, Kenton is said to have saved the life of Daniel Boone.

During the American Revolution, Kenton participated in a number of military engagements against the British and their Native American allies. In 1778, he joined George Rogers Clark on a difficult but successful expedition into the Illinois Country to attack British outposts as well as Native American settlements. 

Returning home, he accompanied Daniel Boone in an attack on the Shawnees’s settlement of Chillicothe near what is now Oldtown, Ohio. That same year, Kenton was captured by the Native Americans, who tortured him and attempted to burn him at the stake. 

Simon Girty rescued him and instead of his being killed, Kenton was sent to Fort Detroit as part of a prisoner trade with the British. By mid-1779, Kenton was free and had returned to service under George Rogers Clark. 

That is all quite a story. If you are a football fan in Kentucky and love the high school game as much as we, it isn’t any better of a story than Durrell Turner’s.

Turner is a 5’7,” 170-pound RB who proved himself to be mighty versatile over the course of his junior year. He led 6A in rushing yards (1,401-yards), in spite of his only getting 195-carries and 10-games of run.

Turner averaged 7.19-or so yards per carry and scored a TD every 15-rushing attempts over the course of the ’23 season. Those are fine numbers playing at Kentucky’s highest classification of competitive, full contact football.

Turner’s team was 5-5 in ’23 and lost its first round game after only scheduling nine (9) games in the regular season. Playing nine-game regular seasons for high schools competing in either northern or eastern Kentucky is not altogether uncommon.

Turner caught a handful of passes out of the backfield (7), led the team in scoring, and even played a little defense. Turner wasn’t Lawrence Taylor, but he did register a few tackles on the year.

Regardless of how much defensive run he enjoyed, it is very uncommon for 6A athletes to get two-way play in football. It is even more uncommon still where the player in question is the team’s most lethal backfield threat.

Turner made the 6A All-State football team in ’23 and was additionally named to the All Northern Kentucky, First Team. There are plenty of college programs evaluating this top-flight RB and his 3.3 GPA should make pulling the trigger with an offer an easy move.

This guy here should prove as rough and tough a customer as the man for whom his high school was named. Who knows; maybe they can change the name of the school to Kenton-Turner High. It has a nice ring to it!

This is Friday Night Fletch, reporting for KPGFootball, reminding you to PLAY THROUGH THE WHISTLE!

If you enjoyed this article and wish to gain full-access to the site, then subscribe monthly to Kentucky Prep Gridiron by following the prompts! 

© The information contained on this site is the copyrighted intellectual property of KPGFootball. Any unauthorized dissemination of this material without the author’s express written consent is strictly prohibited!