Tim Patton and Jasina Gooden raised him. The Hermitage is home. And Lipscomb Academy has molded him.
Next year, Chauncey Gooden will take the next step in his life more than 1,100 miles away from home in Boulder, Colorado. The Lipscomb Academy senior committed to play for Deion Sanders and Colorado last month. While he eagerly anticipates that move, he’s keenly aware of how it sets him apart.
“I’ll be the first in my immediate family to have this opportunity,” Gooden said. “And I’m really not even talking about football. I’ll be the first to have a chance to go to college. For me, that’s in a lot of ways, bigger than playing football.”
Gooden, a 6-foot-4, 320-pound offensive lineman, is the No. 8 recruit in Tennessee for the class of 2025 and the No. 19 interior offensive lineman in the country, according to the 247Sports Composite. The four-star lineman listed Tennessee along with Auburn, Clemson, Colorado, Georgia, Michigan, Missouri, Oklahoma, Oregon and South Carolina among his top 10 schools last December before deciding on Colorado.
Gooden is No. 5 on The Tennessean’s 2024 Dandy Dozen list, a collection of the top 12 college football prospects of the 2025 class, in the Nashville area selected by the newspaper.
Chauncey Gooden was a football player from the beginning
Gooden’s mother, Jasina, can still recall how physically gifted and rambunctious Chauncey was, even as a 2-year-old before football was even a word Chauncey could say.
“He had this oversized Care Bear at 2-years-old,” Jasina said. “I was trying to get him tired and the Care Bear was about two-foot tall, about the same size as Chauncey at that age. We’re on the floor wrestling with it.”
Suddenly Chauncey picked himself up off the floor, backed up and charged his mother at full speed.
“Like a bull, he backs up and then charges,” she said. “He comes at me full-force and I brace myself as he tackles me. Tackle, is the only way I can explain it, because he wraps up the bear and me and takes me back to the floor. He did that about four or five times. That’s when I knew he was going to be a football player.”
By the time Chauncey was an 8-year-old, football had become an obsession.
“I watched a ton of highlights on my iPad,” he said. “I can’t remember if I was watching full games at that point, but I know I was watching a lot of highlight clips. I’d watch them all day. I still love to watch them.”
Chauncey Gooden has athletic roots
Gooden’s father, Tim Patton, was a standout offensive and defensive lineman at Whites Creek, graduating in 2003. But Patton’s athletic career only took him as far as high school. Jasina Gooden graduated from Hillsboro in 2001. Aside from taking college courses, neither have a college degree.
Patton and Jasina Gooden have been together since before Chauncey was born. The two are now engaged, but when Chauncey was born in 2007, both decided he’d take his mother’s last name.
Chauncey is fond of the Hermitage. It’s where he developed his love of the game. And when he arrived at Lipscomb Academy as a middle school student, the adjustment to a private school took some time.
TOP OFFENSIVE LINEMEN Ranking Nashville area’s top 20 offensive linemen returning in 2024
“It wasn’t immediate,” Jasina said. “He had to get used to a different environment but I realized that this was the place I needed to be to put myself in a position I’m in today.”
Patton admits that the days of he and his son arguing over who was a better high school lineman are over.
“Oh yeah, he’s way better than I was at his age,” Patton said laughing. “It’s not so much about his physical gifts, but his mind and understanding of the game is so much more advanced. As you get older, you get more knowledgeable. I know things now about the game that I didn’t know when I was in high school. Chauncey’s already there.”
Lipscomb Academy Mustangs’ four-star lineman develops into leader
Gooden has been among the nation’s top interior linemen for two years and was a part of the Mustangs team when they won consecutive TSSAA Division II-AA state titles in 2021 and 2022 under former coach Trent Dilfer. New Mustangs coach Jamie Graham arrived last December after the team played one year under former Tennessee Titans lineman, and NFL Hall of Famer, Kevin Mawae.
“When Chauncey speaks, everyone listens,” Graham said. “And the great thing about his game is he’s has been working with NFL offensive linemen as coaches the past few years.”
Gooden — like teammate CJ Jimcoily, both of whom found unique ways to announce college scholarship offers through social media posts — is a team-favorite. He has the respect of his teammates, the school and his parents beam with pride at the mention of his name.
“Everyone we meet, who’s met our son, always says the same thing … ‘We love Chauncey’,” Jasina Gooden said. “It makes us feel good as parents when you hear people talk in that way. He’s a great kid and a very protective one.”
Reach sports writer George Robinson at georgerobinsontheleafchronicle.com and on the X platform (formerly Twitter) @Cville_Sports.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Chauncey Gooden: 4-star OL commit for Deion Sanders, Colorado football
The Tennessean
