His new favorite colors? Purple-and-gold, baby. Helllllo, Roman Catholic.
"It just seemed like more things were pulling me here," Shields said. "And that I'd be more comfortable. That it would be the best fit."
Shields, a 6-2, 235-pound senior, is slated to start for Roman's football team as an offensive tackle, in addition to seeing backup duty along the defensive line.
In the new-experience realm, it's not as if he's going it alone.
Roman coach Joe McCourt - prominent, Shields said, in getting him to attend North during a stint as an assistant there - said his 2010 varsity includes nine players from North and three more from Dougherty. A whopping eight are expected to start.
Along the O-line, aside from Shields, you can find guards Khalif Jackson and Jolan Hardy and tackle Kyle McDowell (all CD). The other ex-Falcon starters are wideout William Fuller, defensive linemen Jack Schanz (end) and Tyrone Brown (tackle) and d-back Taishan Tucker.
Thirty-six percent of the starters. Not a bad haul.
But is there any bad blood? The new guys, don't forget, are claiming jobs that otherwise would have gone to holdovers.
"Actually, everything has gone pretty easy," Shields said. "All the Roman kids have been accepting.
"I could tell I made the right move when I first went to an offseason workout. Everything just looked, and felt, good. And when we started coming together as a group [for official practices], I kept thinking, 'We have a top-level team.' "
As Shields is the only senior among the former Falcons, feel free to call him the go-to-Roman ringleader.
"Once myself and a couple juniors decided we were going, we talked to the younger guys," he said. "Turned into a pretty big group."
Though hardly all-encompassing.
McDevitt, Archbishop Ryan, West Catholic and Judge are expecting to boast a total of 31 former North/Dougherty players on their varsity rosters this season, with 15 tentatively slated to start.
