Chicago's Demetrius Cooper, a defensive lineman at Michigan State, is a graduate of Percy Julian High School in Washington Heights. View Full Caption Michigan State Athletics

CHICAGO — Demetrius Cooper said football saved his life.

"If it wasn't for football and me leaving Chicago, I probably would have been a statistic, out on the streets or probably dead," said Cooper, an Englewood native and Percy Julian High School graduate now playing football for Michigan State.

"Who knows what could have happened if I wasn't here" in East Lansing, said Cooper.

Cooper, a sophomore defensive lineman for the No. 3 Spartans (12-1), said Michigan State's campus is like living on "another planet" compared to the mean streets of Englewood he managed to escape. He said he prays for his parents, three younger brothers and younger sister, and friends still in the city.

"I have family back home, little brothers [that] have to walk through that neighborhood," Cooper said. "I found a way to beat the odds, and not too many people where I'm from are able to do that. I've got a lot of friends in the streets doing bad things. I pray for them every night, but I'm here, so there's not much else I can do. Chicago is not the place you want to be now."

Justin Breen says Cooper prays every night for his siblings:

Cooper, who also starred for Morgan Park High School before transferring to Julian, said five members of his Julian graduating class have been killed due to gang violence.

"The killing has to stop. The city has no hope basically," he said. "People standing on the corner, people have no home to go to. Most of the [people] don't even have a chance; they're just born into it. In Chicago, you smell the gunsmoke. It makes me shed a tear sometimes."

Cooper's older brother, Steve Taylor, a basketball player at Toledo, said he's proud of his younger sibling.

"Thanks to the man upstairs, my little brother is becoming the young man that makes my mother smile each and every day, and he's also teaching and leading by example for my brothers younger than him," said Taylor, a former star at Simeon who transferred to Toledo from Marquette. "Chicago is a very very bad place right now and people are dying every single day, and my family is blessed that my brothers and I are focused on trying to make it out."

Cooper, whose Spartans play Alabama in a Cotton Bowl national semifinal matchup Thursday, said he considers himself a "shining light" to the kids in Chicago who look up to him. After graduation, Cooper, who has 20 tackles and 4 sacks this season, wants to set up a nonprofit organization to help the city's youth.

When he visits home, Cooper said youngsters are always excited to ask him about Michigan State, where's he's majoring in advertising, and how they can get to college, too.

"I feel like I bring a brightness in their life, to the kids at home," Cooper said. "No one really comes out of Julian. Everybody is just really happy to see me. Eventually, whatever I can do to help get the kids off the streets, I'll do it."

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