Former Boston College wide receiver Zay Flowers has quite an opportunity this week.

Flowers is at the East-West Shrine Bowl this week in Las Vegas and happens to be on the West team roster, which is also the team being coached by the New England Patriots staff. While Zay probably won’t be around by the time the Pats pick in the second round, he probably won’t be taken 14th overall by a team that needs help at linebacker, cornerback, tackle and receiver.

Still, for local fans (and media) around this area, Zay being a Patriot would be a lot of fun. There’s word he’s been getting a lot of work during the first few practices as a punt returner, which would be very interesting if he did end up with the ‘Flying Elvis” logo on his helmet.

Flowers spoke to PFN while in Vegas about not entering the draft last season. As we all know, Flowers not only didn’t declare for the draft last year, but turned down multiple six-figure deals to transfer from BC in order to finish out his final season with the Eagles and get his degree.

“To prove everything they said I couldn’t do, honestly,” Flowers said. “I felt like I went out and did that this year. We had a bad year, but there was a lot of things that went into it. We had a young O-Line, we had some D-line convert to O-line, we had a new O-line starting unit every week, so it got kind of rough. Quarterback got hurt, backup had to come in, so it was like…I just wanted to go out and compete and show everybody what I could do and that I could do it at a high level. I feel like I did that.”

Flowers won’t be participating in the game on Thursday night, but was asked what he plans to run in the 40 during the NFL Combine in March.

“I’d say low 4-3’s,” he added. “Hopefully 4.2, but I’ve never ran a 40 in my life. I’ve only timed the 10-yard, that’s what we did, the 10-yard splits. (I’ve ran) like a 1.40…the start is the hardest part Just opening up and running, every football player do that naturally. I’ve never ran track before. I played basketball, I actually played basketball more than football in high school.”

Flowers’ ability to be versatile and dynamic no matter where he ends up is what’s going to allow him to have what everyone hopes is a long and successful career…hopefully in Foxborough.