Published On: Thu, May 28th, 2015

Boca High’s ‘Triple Threat’ Athletes Excel on Field, in Band, Academically

By Palm Beach County School Public Affairs

BOCA RATON – When Nigel and Elgin Davis first picked up musical instruments in the sixth grade, Nigel could barely make a sound on an old saxophone, and the slide came off  his twin brother Elgin’s trombone.

Within six months of them working and practicing hard, their music teacher at Emerald Cove Middle School suggested that their father, Eric Davis, find private lessons to further challenge them. The skill of their playing had already exceeded the rest of the music class, Matt Jensen told the elder Davis.

“They are both just internally driven,” said Eric Davis, Boca Raton High School head football coach and spokesman for the Palm Beach Sheriff’s Office. “They are competitive with each other in the classroom, on the football field and even in music.”

It is that kind of combination of talent and hard work that earned the Davis brothers the nicknames “Triple Threat” at Boca Raton High School. The 18-year-old seniors play in the jazz band, both earned all-conference honors on the football team and excel in the classroom where they are members of the National Honor Society. They also were among 1,600 high school seniors who were named semifinalists in the 51st annual National Achievement Scholarship Program.

Elgin, who plays defensive back, signed a football scholarship to Harvard University over Georgia Tech and Nigel, a wide receiver, will be heading to the University of Florida in Gainesville. They both will study mechanical engineering.

“I feel like I’m definitely leading by example and showing that if you play football you can also have good grades and you can go to a good school and you don’t have to let your grades slack just because you are an athlete,” he told WPBF Ch. 25.

They turned down offers from other prestigious schools across the country such as Dartmouth and Vanderbilt.

Along with football, where their dad coached them directly through much of their careers, the Davis brothers have also been shining stars in music. Elgin blossomed from having his trombone slide fall off his first time to now being an outstanding soloist on trumpet in the school’s jazz band. Last month, he added the Lakeside Jazz Festival in Port Orange to his credit.  Both brothers have also participated in the school district’s annual music camp at Bak Middle School of the Arts where the top musicians in the district learn from instructors from the prestigious Julliard School, one of the nation’s leading music schools.

Eric Davis, who has 30 years of football coaching and playing experience but no musical background, said he had no idea what talent his boys actually had in jazz when they started. Within months of Nigel starting to play he was on stage at the B.B. King’s club in West Palm Beach jamming with a professional band. He had music teachers from the University of Miami praising his potential and raw talent. Ever since then Nigel has been playing paying gigs as a musician to earn his own money on the side to pay for things like extra back to school clothes, something he plans to continue at college.

“For me it has just been about enjoying the journey,” Davis said, as he looked back at his sons who have gone from amazing students in Palm Beach County public schools to amazing men ready to conquer the world separately and together. “Watching them go from this little person who can barely crawl at the beginning to somebody who can do things that just stun you, there is just no feeling like it.”

This report was supplemented with information from WPBF CH-25 and WPEC CH-12.

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