WACO, Texas — The seeds of a football career were planted very early on for Josh Cameron. As a kid, his family would take him along when they went to football practices and games for his older brother.

“Literally like 3 years old, he would start mimicking the drills that my older son’s friends were doing at practice,” said Andrea Cameron, Josh’s mother. 

Cameron continued to play both football and basketball as he grew up, but ultimately thrived on the field as a receiver at Cedar Park High School. He played on varsity at the end of his sophomore season and then had a big junior season as the leading receiver for the Timberwolves in 2019.

He was getting recruiting attention and was set for a busy spring and summer of visits in 2020, when all those plans changed.

“COVID, it literally destroyed recruiting for the 2021 class, it truly did,” Andrea said. “We had all of these plans made that were supposed to happen in March and of course COVID happened. All of these junior days got shut down, everything changed in an instant.”

“I look back and dang the pandemic kind of hindered my recruiting,” Josh said. “I look back and I’m honestly thankful for the journey of kind of being that underdog.”

With his recruiting on hold, Josh focused on his senior season. Cedar Park had a strong group coming back in 2020, with Josh being one of the key pieces. He dominated on the field with another 1,000 yard receiving season and helped the Timberwolves reach the 5A state title game.

“It was awesome. There’s nothing like playing with your boys, your high school friends you grew up playing with,” Josh said. 

Despite putting up huge numbers and being a part of a very successful team, the recruiting attention wasn’t there for a guy with his skill set. He had some D2 and smaller schools offers, as well as some preferred walk-on offers at D1 schools. Josh wrestled with the idea of taking a full ride scholarship to a smaller school or taking a chance to pay his way and earn a spot at the division one level. He chose to bet on himself and took a walk-on spot at Baylor. 

“I felt something was different that they would actually look at me and give me a chance for me to prove myself to them,” Josh said. 

“They had a vision for him, they didn’t have a scholarship for him, but they definitely had a vision as we see you as someone who would absolutely be a great fit within the program,” Andrea said. 

When he got to Baylor, he had a plan to create a role for himself on the team. In his freshman season, that started with making an impact on special teams.

“I got to get on the field so my first immediate thought was special teams,” Josh said. “I started to get on all of them and used that energy going into the next year but instead of just special teams I want to contribute on offense.”

In the spring after his freshman season, Josh did just that. He started climbing up the depth chart at the receiver position and proved himself enough to coaches that in the summer ahead of his sophomore year, he got the unexpected news from Coach Aranda.

“He was like, ‘Hey man, we’re going to put you on scholarship,’” Josh recalled of that moment in Coach Aranda’s office. “I was like whoa, you just kind of dropped a bombshell right on me. A whole bunch of emotions, I called my mom she was crying, we was all crying tears of joy.”

“Your son is calling you crying and I’m like, 'Josh, what happened, what’s wrong?'” Andrea said. “He’s like, ‘Mom, they’re putting me on scholarship,’ so my husband and I, we start balling.”

Being put on a scholarship was a significant moment, but it wasn’t the end for Josh. He was determined to get on the field more as a receiver and that happened toward the end of the 2022 season.

He started four games, had 28 catches and was second on the team with 386 receiving yards. Heading into the 2023 season, he has continued to evolve as one of the leaders on this Baylor team and was invited to represent the Bears at Big 12 media days.

“My teammates kind of have that faith and trust in me and even the coaches,” Josh said. “I’m just living in the moment not getting too caught up in I’m a leader, just trying to stay true to myself.”

“It’s up from here, we’re like yeah son, keep going,” Andrea said. “Keep striving, keep doing the things you want to do because we’re going to be there cheering him on. That’s what we do.”