WAKE COUNTY — Wake Christian Academy will play for the state championship in 8-man football. One of the big reasons is senior Matt Thornbrough.

Randy Johnson, Wake Christian Academy football coach, says Thornbrough does it all on the football field.

"He can play wide-out for us. He can play tailback or quarterback and defensive back, so he can pretty much do it all," says coach Randy Johnson. "He pushes himself harder."

Thornbrough is a leader on the football field and the classroom where he holds a 4.3 GPA.

"I see someone who God has blessed with more ability and talent than any student that I have ever taught," says teacher Becki Buffaloe. "He is very determined in everything he does. He does not accept just getting by.

"He wants to do his very best, but the thing that I admire about him is that when some people are like that, they are very conceited and sometimes arrogant, and he is anything but," she says.

Thornbrough says the important thing to him is earning everyone's respect.

"I would like to talk to everybody. I don't have a specific group of people who I want to be with all of the time or just have my mind set on one set of people," he says. You can't go talking about people behind their back. You have to be straightforward with them, and earning respect is the biggest thing."

Matt Thornbrough is this week's winner of the Extra Effort Award. Tom Suiter's Extra Effort award airs Wednesdays during WRAL's 6:00 News.

Do you have a nomination for the Extra Effort Award?Mail us your suggestions.