Football Alum Focused on Wellness Through Children’s Book Series
Nov 12, 2024 | Football, General
*** The following is a question and answer session with football alum Xavier Rush, a businessman, a community engagement activist and most recently a children's book author.***
Rush was a wide receiver for the Tulane football team from 2011-2014. In his time with the Green Wave, he totaled 99 catches for 1349 yards with 12 touchdowns in 45 games.
Tulane Green Wave (TGW): Xavier, please introduce yourself to our readers?
Xavier Rush (XR):Â My name is Xavier Rush. I'm from Jackson, Mississippi, where I attended high school at Terry High School. I was a Tulane student-athlete from 2011 to 2014 and graduated with a
Bachelor of Science degree in Neuroscience with a minor in Psychology. I have done a plethora of professions and I was also blessed enough to play in both the NFL (National Football League) with the Philadelphia Eagles and the New Orleans Saints and the CFL (Canadian Football League) for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Saskatchewan Roughriders. I also have spent time in the classroom as an educator. Recently, I have focused my attention on becoming a serial entrepreneur to combine a few of my passions focused on being a positive influence in the community.
TGW: What first brought you to Tulane and why was the school where you wanted to attend?
XR: My recruiting process was very stressful. Vanderbilt was my dream school, and I committed to that program my senior year in high school. About three weeks before signing day, Vanderbilt changed their coaching staff and called me to inform me the verbal scholarship had been taken away. My father, over the next 10 to 14 days, sent every college in America my highlight tape, my accolades and an excerpt of me as a person. Tulane saw the highlights and then wide receiver coach, Thomas Woods, reached out to me and offered me a verbal scholarship. Unfortunately, a week later he had to rescind the offer because they had to sign a hometown player, so I told him I wasn't going to come on a visit. My dad talked me into going to visit Tulane and I had a great time. I then had a conversation with Coach Woods because Head Coach Bob Toledo had been asking questions to gauge my interest in attending Tulane. I told him that if I could, I would. Coach said that is good to hear as one of the team's scholarship players had just missed his morning meeting and was released from the team leaving one scholarship open. Even crazier was this was also my Dad's birthday so that is why I tell people that my attending Tulane was just meant to be.
TGW: What was your favorite part of your time here?
XR: My favorite part was being with my teammates. Those relationships I built at Tulane remain some of my closest friends to this day. We call each other 102 as we were all teammates and roommates. We're still very tight and remain close. Those are some of the people that helped me when I was down and praised me when I was up. So, the people I've met, the connections I've made and then just the city in general. You see, I haven't left New Orleans. I'm still rooted here trying to enhance the community and raise up individuals around me.
TGW: How did you decide that Neuroscience and Psychology were going to be your areas of study?
XR: I was a STEM head (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). I have always loved science. My mom was a mathematics major. Science and math always came easy to me and I always wanted to do something related to those areas. Initially, I want to do something in chemistry, but when I came to Tulane, started taking chemistry courses I realized that the subject area was just not for me. So, I pivoted, as I still wanted something challenging and interesting that would allow me to continue to learn from daily. Neuroscience was so appealing to me plus a few of my fellow student-athletes were also studying the major like Jamie Kaplan, Bryce Santiago, and Jacob Davis. All three of them are now doctors. I just loved learning about the brain and figuring out how we think, why we think the way we do and how we are influenced. It was a great fit for me as I was very interested in the subject area which made it easier.
TGW: What were your plans upon graduation?
XR: When I first got to college here, my plan was to come to Tulane, get a degree in pre-med, go play in the NFL and then come back after my career was over and get my doctorate before attending
medical school and opening my own practice. That was how everything was going to play out in my mind if everything went perfectly. Unfortunately, I tore my ACL in the middle of my senior season at the same time when I was leading the country in yards per catch. I had been playing well and had scored a touchdown every game that year. The scouts and the NFL personnel were projecting me as top three-round pick. Tearing my ACL derailed the fairy tale plans and forced me to decide whether I should study for the MCAT to attend medical school or rehab and try to perform at Pro Day to get an invitation to the NFL Combine. I decided to continue to pursue my dream of being an NFL player, so I put all my eggs in the basket of getting healthy and trying to pursue my athletic career.
TGW: Talk to us about your professional playing career?
XR: I feel that my experience as a professional athlete helped me be who I am today in my business career because it allowed me to understand the politics of professional athletics. It helped me understand that I can only control so much and to always put my best foot forward. I sat out the year after I graduated because of concerns about my knee. In that time, I ended up teaching school until March when the Philadelphia Eagles called me for a tryout that I was signed at. I then spent the entire offseason and the first part of the season with the Eagles before I was cut. From there I bounced around and met a lot of people in the NFL making connections along the way and learning through every interaction. I learned that the right timing was just as important as the right opportunity in professional sports.
TGW: Were you able to stay close with your Tulane teammates?
XR: Yes, until last year we were all still in the city, but we have dispersed more since then. We still find ways to stay connected daily though through our group messages and shared activities such as the NCAA Football game. We still support each other often through phone calls, texts and lining up our schedules to see each other whenever we can.
TGW: Have you had the chance to come back onto campus?
XR: When I first graduated, I wasn't coming back to campus often but that changed about a year and a half ago and I have been back a lot since then. I would like to implement different things on campus with the current student-athletes and want to be someone they can use as a resource with internships at my gym and some of the other business that I am involved with. I've been working closely with Tulane Assistant Director of Student Athlete Development Dantiel Daniels. The changes that have been made to the athletic facilities have been amazing. The locker room and the weight room are totally different. It is great to see all the growth. It is also great to see a former coach of mine, Jon Sumrall, leading the program as the head football coach as well.
TGW: What have you gotten into after your playing career?
XR: Â Since I ended my football playing career, I created a brand called XR Elite. The overall mission for XR Elite is as a wellness package. So, when you come here, it's not just about fitness or
looking good, it's about understanding how to be fit, understanding how to eat, understanding what things do for your body. Our mission is to prepare everyone to be the best version of themselves both mentally and physically. I started a nonprofit called RUSH (Reconstruction Under Structural Health). It embodies everything I said under four main pillars 1) physical health, 2) nutritional health, 3) mental health and 4) financial health. We have a gym where we do memberships and personal training for athletes of all ages. We also work with NOLA Detox, which is a detox recovery center in the city. We work with assisted living homes and also work with local high schools. There's no capacity that we're not willing to assist in when it comes to wellness. It is my passion to help and assist individuals in finding what's the best approach for them in their wellness journey.
TGW:Â If someone wants to connect with you and get more information about you and the programs that XR Elite offers is there a website to go to?
XR: Yes, I have a website. It is xr-elite.co. My Instagram is @_XRElite. You can also see me personally on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook. We have a lot of different things that we supply on those platforms and we also have different products such as apparel, books and things of that nature.
TGW: Tell us some more about your book?
XR: I wrote a book titled The Fitness Alphabet XR Elite Wellness Edition. This book has a variety of different words that correlate with fitness. The planned series will talk about the four pillars of
wellness that I previously mentioned. I want to instill those pillars into our youth starting with fitness. The upcoming topics of the series will be on the mental health alphabet, then the nutritional alphabet, and finally financial literacy alphabet. I did this because I always want to change our community's thinking about health. Most of my clientele are young adults, and honestly, we must fix our ways if we want to eliminate bad and unnecessary habits from a young age to make the next generation better. We can implement information in books to them when they're four, or five, or six, like from Pre-K while learning their alphabet and sentence structure while also hearing words about working out, calories, push-ups, fasting, Zen, yoga, things that a lot of people in my generation didn't hear about until we were much older. I believe if you hear about wellness at a young age, it's easier to implement good and sound lifelong habits. I have the Fitness Alphabet already out now and I have the Mental Health Alphabet that will be released later this fall.
TGW: Where can people find your book?
XR: You can find the book on Amazon. It is my goal to get it into schools as a curriculum by doing readings at schools, reading fairs, and community outreach programs.
TGW: Are there any other programs that you are involved with?
XR: We also involved with the XR Elite Cultural Expo annually, where we have fashion, music and vendors. We just did a big health event at the Convention Center during September with the Urban League where we attempt to interject positivity, genuineness, and wellness into the community.
TGW: Where is the best place to find information about the places you will be and events that you will be involved with in the future?
XR: My website is the best place to find information. I welcome emails at info@xr-elite.co . I look at all the messages and I personally respond to everything. I also am open to talking to currentÂ
student-athletes about Name Image and Likeness and how each of them is their own brand and business and all the additional areas related to being an LLC. Basically, all the information that I wish that I had earlier in my life.
_________________________________________________________________________
TICKETS
Tickets for the football and the men's and women's basketball seasons can be purchased by calling 504-861-WAVE (9283), logging on to TulaneTix.com or visiting the ticket office at the James W. Wilson Jr. Center.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Follow Tulane football on Twitter and Facebook and Instagram. Follow Tulane Athletics on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
Â
WE ARE NOLA BUILT
Tulane University is located in the city of New Orleans. It is a city built on tradition and resiliency. The lessons Green Wave student-athletes have learned through their connection with this university and city have BUILT doctors, lawyers, business leaders, conference champions, all-conference players, All-Americans, professional athletes and NCAA tournament teams. The city of New Orleans has shaped us into who we are today. We are One City. We are Tulane. We are NOLA BUILT. Check out our story at NolaBuilt.com.
Â
Rush was a wide receiver for the Tulane football team from 2011-2014. In his time with the Green Wave, he totaled 99 catches for 1349 yards with 12 touchdowns in 45 games.
Tulane Green Wave (TGW): Xavier, please introduce yourself to our readers?
Xavier Rush (XR):Â My name is Xavier Rush. I'm from Jackson, Mississippi, where I attended high school at Terry High School. I was a Tulane student-athlete from 2011 to 2014 and graduated with a
Bachelor of Science degree in Neuroscience with a minor in Psychology. I have done a plethora of professions and I was also blessed enough to play in both the NFL (National Football League) with the Philadelphia Eagles and the New Orleans Saints and the CFL (Canadian Football League) for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Saskatchewan Roughriders. I also have spent time in the classroom as an educator. Recently, I have focused my attention on becoming a serial entrepreneur to combine a few of my passions focused on being a positive influence in the community.TGW: What first brought you to Tulane and why was the school where you wanted to attend?
XR: My recruiting process was very stressful. Vanderbilt was my dream school, and I committed to that program my senior year in high school. About three weeks before signing day, Vanderbilt changed their coaching staff and called me to inform me the verbal scholarship had been taken away. My father, over the next 10 to 14 days, sent every college in America my highlight tape, my accolades and an excerpt of me as a person. Tulane saw the highlights and then wide receiver coach, Thomas Woods, reached out to me and offered me a verbal scholarship. Unfortunately, a week later he had to rescind the offer because they had to sign a hometown player, so I told him I wasn't going to come on a visit. My dad talked me into going to visit Tulane and I had a great time. I then had a conversation with Coach Woods because Head Coach Bob Toledo had been asking questions to gauge my interest in attending Tulane. I told him that if I could, I would. Coach said that is good to hear as one of the team's scholarship players had just missed his morning meeting and was released from the team leaving one scholarship open. Even crazier was this was also my Dad's birthday so that is why I tell people that my attending Tulane was just meant to be.
TGW: What was your favorite part of your time here?
XR: My favorite part was being with my teammates. Those relationships I built at Tulane remain some of my closest friends to this day. We call each other 102 as we were all teammates and roommates. We're still very tight and remain close. Those are some of the people that helped me when I was down and praised me when I was up. So, the people I've met, the connections I've made and then just the city in general. You see, I haven't left New Orleans. I'm still rooted here trying to enhance the community and raise up individuals around me.
TGW: How did you decide that Neuroscience and Psychology were going to be your areas of study?
XR: I was a STEM head (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). I have always loved science. My mom was a mathematics major. Science and math always came easy to me and I always wanted to do something related to those areas. Initially, I want to do something in chemistry, but when I came to Tulane, started taking chemistry courses I realized that the subject area was just not for me. So, I pivoted, as I still wanted something challenging and interesting that would allow me to continue to learn from daily. Neuroscience was so appealing to me plus a few of my fellow student-athletes were also studying the major like Jamie Kaplan, Bryce Santiago, and Jacob Davis. All three of them are now doctors. I just loved learning about the brain and figuring out how we think, why we think the way we do and how we are influenced. It was a great fit for me as I was very interested in the subject area which made it easier.
TGW: What were your plans upon graduation?
XR: When I first got to college here, my plan was to come to Tulane, get a degree in pre-med, go play in the NFL and then come back after my career was over and get my doctorate before attending
medical school and opening my own practice. That was how everything was going to play out in my mind if everything went perfectly. Unfortunately, I tore my ACL in the middle of my senior season at the same time when I was leading the country in yards per catch. I had been playing well and had scored a touchdown every game that year. The scouts and the NFL personnel were projecting me as top three-round pick. Tearing my ACL derailed the fairy tale plans and forced me to decide whether I should study for the MCAT to attend medical school or rehab and try to perform at Pro Day to get an invitation to the NFL Combine. I decided to continue to pursue my dream of being an NFL player, so I put all my eggs in the basket of getting healthy and trying to pursue my athletic career.TGW: Talk to us about your professional playing career?
XR: I feel that my experience as a professional athlete helped me be who I am today in my business career because it allowed me to understand the politics of professional athletics. It helped me understand that I can only control so much and to always put my best foot forward. I sat out the year after I graduated because of concerns about my knee. In that time, I ended up teaching school until March when the Philadelphia Eagles called me for a tryout that I was signed at. I then spent the entire offseason and the first part of the season with the Eagles before I was cut. From there I bounced around and met a lot of people in the NFL making connections along the way and learning through every interaction. I learned that the right timing was just as important as the right opportunity in professional sports.
TGW: Were you able to stay close with your Tulane teammates?
XR: Yes, until last year we were all still in the city, but we have dispersed more since then. We still find ways to stay connected daily though through our group messages and shared activities such as the NCAA Football game. We still support each other often through phone calls, texts and lining up our schedules to see each other whenever we can.
TGW: Have you had the chance to come back onto campus?
XR: When I first graduated, I wasn't coming back to campus often but that changed about a year and a half ago and I have been back a lot since then. I would like to implement different things on campus with the current student-athletes and want to be someone they can use as a resource with internships at my gym and some of the other business that I am involved with. I've been working closely with Tulane Assistant Director of Student Athlete Development Dantiel Daniels. The changes that have been made to the athletic facilities have been amazing. The locker room and the weight room are totally different. It is great to see all the growth. It is also great to see a former coach of mine, Jon Sumrall, leading the program as the head football coach as well.
TGW: What have you gotten into after your playing career?
XR: Â Since I ended my football playing career, I created a brand called XR Elite. The overall mission for XR Elite is as a wellness package. So, when you come here, it's not just about fitness or
looking good, it's about understanding how to be fit, understanding how to eat, understanding what things do for your body. Our mission is to prepare everyone to be the best version of themselves both mentally and physically. I started a nonprofit called RUSH (Reconstruction Under Structural Health). It embodies everything I said under four main pillars 1) physical health, 2) nutritional health, 3) mental health and 4) financial health. We have a gym where we do memberships and personal training for athletes of all ages. We also work with NOLA Detox, which is a detox recovery center in the city. We work with assisted living homes and also work with local high schools. There's no capacity that we're not willing to assist in when it comes to wellness. It is my passion to help and assist individuals in finding what's the best approach for them in their wellness journey.TGW:Â If someone wants to connect with you and get more information about you and the programs that XR Elite offers is there a website to go to?
XR: Yes, I have a website. It is xr-elite.co. My Instagram is @_XRElite. You can also see me personally on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook. We have a lot of different things that we supply on those platforms and we also have different products such as apparel, books and things of that nature.
TGW: Tell us some more about your book?
XR: I wrote a book titled The Fitness Alphabet XR Elite Wellness Edition. This book has a variety of different words that correlate with fitness. The planned series will talk about the four pillars of
wellness that I previously mentioned. I want to instill those pillars into our youth starting with fitness. The upcoming topics of the series will be on the mental health alphabet, then the nutritional alphabet, and finally financial literacy alphabet. I did this because I always want to change our community's thinking about health. Most of my clientele are young adults, and honestly, we must fix our ways if we want to eliminate bad and unnecessary habits from a young age to make the next generation better. We can implement information in books to them when they're four, or five, or six, like from Pre-K while learning their alphabet and sentence structure while also hearing words about working out, calories, push-ups, fasting, Zen, yoga, things that a lot of people in my generation didn't hear about until we were much older. I believe if you hear about wellness at a young age, it's easier to implement good and sound lifelong habits. I have the Fitness Alphabet already out now and I have the Mental Health Alphabet that will be released later this fall.TGW: Where can people find your book?
XR: You can find the book on Amazon. It is my goal to get it into schools as a curriculum by doing readings at schools, reading fairs, and community outreach programs.
TGW: Are there any other programs that you are involved with?
XR: We also involved with the XR Elite Cultural Expo annually, where we have fashion, music and vendors. We just did a big health event at the Convention Center during September with the Urban League where we attempt to interject positivity, genuineness, and wellness into the community.
TGW: Where is the best place to find information about the places you will be and events that you will be involved with in the future?
XR: My website is the best place to find information. I welcome emails at info@xr-elite.co . I look at all the messages and I personally respond to everything. I also am open to talking to currentÂ
student-athletes about Name Image and Likeness and how each of them is their own brand and business and all the additional areas related to being an LLC. Basically, all the information that I wish that I had earlier in my life._________________________________________________________________________
TICKETS
Tickets for the football and the men's and women's basketball seasons can be purchased by calling 504-861-WAVE (9283), logging on to TulaneTix.com or visiting the ticket office at the James W. Wilson Jr. Center.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Follow Tulane football on Twitter and Facebook and Instagram. Follow Tulane Athletics on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
Â
WE ARE NOLA BUILT
Tulane University is located in the city of New Orleans. It is a city built on tradition and resiliency. The lessons Green Wave student-athletes have learned through their connection with this university and city have BUILT doctors, lawyers, business leaders, conference champions, all-conference players, All-Americans, professional athletes and NCAA tournament teams. The city of New Orleans has shaped us into who we are today. We are One City. We are Tulane. We are NOLA BUILT. Check out our story at NolaBuilt.com.
Â
Postgame: HC Jon Sumrall and WR Anthony Brown-Stephens - 9/20/25
Sunday, September 21
Postgame: LB Sam Howard - 9/20/25
Sunday, September 21
Tulane Tuesday: WR Shazz Preston - 9/16/25
Tuesday, September 16
Tulane Tuesday: Spear TJ Smith - 9/16/25
Tuesday, September 16
