It Feels Good to Be Part of This Team

#. October 2, 2021

#-1. Athens, Georgia, USA

#-2. University of Georgia

#-3. Sanford Stadium

The moment the black door at the end of the tunnel, sealed shut until now, swung open, a colossal roar came thundering from up ahead. The screams of more than 92,000 fans were loud enough to drown the marching band into mere background noise, and every member of the team except me had already sprinted out into that light.

Chhh—k! Chhh—k!

The newly installed smog machines belched smoke furiously alongside the old ones, and once I could barely see three feet in front of me, I began walking slowly forward. Little lights had been laid out along the floor, so walking straight wasn't much of a challenge.

The roar grew even louder. My ears felt ready to give out. But I paid it no mind, planted my foot forward with force, and bellowed the language I had learned from my roots.

"KEI TE PAPA PAKANGA- HUA-!!" (On this battlefield)

"HE IWI KOTHI!!" (We will become one)

"MO NGA IWI WHANUI!!" (For family and community)

With each word I spat out deliberately, taking another powerful stride forward, the fireworks planted on either side of the tunnel erupted. The original smog and the fireworks' smoke blended together, red stage lighting washed over everything—even I could feel something mystical in the air.

Reaching the very end of the fireworks line, I bolted forward at full speed, and after covering the same ground my teammates had run ahead of me, I came face to face with the men waiting just beyond. Every one of them was staring at me. And before their eyes, I was the first to shout.

"I'M HIM!!"

My teammates echoed it back instantly.

""I'M HIM!!!""

From the stadium speakers, Kevin Gates' 'Push It'—the track I'd requested—was already pouring out. Why that song? Because the album it came from was literally titled I'M HIM, and in every respect it fit football like a glove. So I danced to it. Stepped, slid, and—

"LET'S GO-!!!"

My teammates all crashed into me at once. Only after pumping ourselves up like that for a good while did I pick the hype speech back up where it had left off.

Whew.

This is no joke either.

That burns a serious amount of energy.

"Heh heh heh. Good work out there."

Coach Monken, grinning, fished a small chocolate bar out of his pocket. I snatched it and dropped onto the bench, alternating between the chocolate and a swig of cola. When your energy dips mid-game, everyone scrambles for something to shove down fast—gobs of jam, or a banana slice slathered in Nutella aren't bad—but a single mouthful of cola solved everything for me.

"Hoo—"

I have to do this every single time from now on, don't I?

Better start banking more energy than usual.

During the window when the marching band cleared the field and filed into their designated seats, Holly Rowe, ESPN's sideline reporter for today's broadcast, came walking over to me.

"Wow-ee. What on earth was that just now?"

"A surprise gift. For the fans."

"What were the words you called at the start? You know, right as you came out of the tunnel onto the field?"

"Ah—that's Hawaiian."

"Hawaiian?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Truthfully, that was part of Kahuku High School's haka. I'd called and gotten permission to borrow it.

"'I'M HIM' pretty much means what it sounds like. I'm the guy. I'm that guy—the one who puts on a show. When I shout it first, the team shouts it back. That means we're the best on this field, and we're going to play like it. The dance? I just choreographed it on the fly. Not bad, right?"

"It was tremendous. Reminded me of Ray Lewis."

"Oh—then it worked."

"Sorry?"

"Nothing at all."

If a veteran reporter's mouth had just produced the words Ray Lewis, then the head man was surely satisfied too. Holly Rowe asked whether she could use what she'd just heard on the broadcast, I said sure, and she thanked me and headed off somewhere. Then the head coach came looking for me.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"Impressive stuff."

"Holly Rowe said Ray Lewis came to mind."

"That ought to please the boss plenty, then."

Which was exactly what I'd just been thinking.

As you know, Coach Monken loves catching an opponent off guard, and in that respect his instincts mesh beautifully with mine. First play of the opening drive.

"Go, ready 80-!!"

Shotgun formation. I clapped my hands.

"Ready-!! Set!!"

Snap!

The instant the snap hit my hands, I rotated my torso to hand the ball off to Zamir on my right. But at the very last instant I ripped the ball back out of Zamir's grasp, tucked it away, and took off straight to the right. The first play we'd been given was an RPO—and within it, I chose the keep.

Eleven yards. First down, easy as you like.

Looks like I'll be doing a fair amount of running today.

"Gun. Halo. H-rock. Spider 2-3 X Corner."

Snap!

The reason someone like me—who doesn't usually care for running—had happily accepted an RPO call was the shape of the defense across from us. Arkansas had run a 3-4 through last season, but this year they'd committed to a 3-2-6 dime package. Dime is a defensive formation that employs six defensive backs, typically two safeties and three cornerbacks. The front is built as a 3-2 or a 4-1, and because it carries fewer bulky front-seven bodies and more lean, quick defensive backs, its strength is speed all over the field. It also keeps plenty of defenders aligned deep by default, which makes it well suited to fighting a passing game. In a sense, it was a defense built to counter exactly the way we attack. But weaknesses always exist.

For instance—something like this.

"Turbo, set!"

After taking the snap and turning my back to the line, I faked the handoff to James Cook. Play action. Turning, I picked up the two receivers slashing through the middle and, per the call, fired toward my first read, Ladd McConkey. Second first down, just like that.

Then Ladd wobbled a little. Arkansas' No. 1 and No. 15 had hit him from both sides on the tackle, and somewhere in the collision their helmets had clipped—he looked dizzy. Players swapped onto the field. Jordan, AD, and KJ lined up wide, Darnell settled in at tight end, and Zamir stood in the backfield.

"Ready-!! Set!!"

Snap!

Rush. Pass. And rush again. Our O-linemen shoved Arkansas' D-line effortlessly to one side, and Zamir, attacking the gap that opened on the left, crossed the line of scrimmage and took off. Arkansas' No. 9 grabbed at Zamir's waist trying to haul him down, but at 5-10 and 180 pounds, that was never happening. A third first down. Before we knew it, we'd reached the 40-yard line. On the very next play, Arkansas' No. 21 committed pass interference, gifting us another fifteen yards.

Arkansas was a team that hadn't surrendered a single point in the first quarter all season—but that record was about to end shortly. The 25. The 21. The 14. Back down to the 3. Mixing runs and passes, we gnawed our way to the doorstep of Arkansas' end zone, and on the final play we sent Zamir off to the races for the game's first touchdown. No matter how hard the kid was trying to preserve his body these days, he wasn't about to roll over and do nothing against a 3-2-6. Not when it tied directly into his draft evaluation. He'd be running awfully hard today.

"LET'S GO-!!"

"ALL DAY!! ALL DAY!!"

That made five straight games scoring on the opening drive—and, at the same time, the first first-quarter points Arkansas had allowed all year. What I wanted to say to them was simple: this is just the beginning. A few more beatings to go, fellas. But first—

"JR!!"

I walked over to Justin Robinson, who had dropped an easy catch a little while ago, and told him it was nothing to dwell on. Mistakes are a routine part of football. All you do is accept it and move forward. Learn something from the error and make sure it doesn't happen twice, and one or two drops won't hurt you a bit.

Right?

"That's it!! That's exactly it!!"

"I told you it would work!!"

"Whooooo-!!"

Common sense. The belief that the knowledge acquired by any member of modern society constitutes basic education. Put another way, it means such knowledge stands nowhere near an absolute standard—and the prejudice most easily planted in any individual is, precisely, that individual's own common sense. And when that common sense got flipped on its head, Arkansas' defense, which had been resisting for its life, collapsed without ceremony.

Being steamrolled on both sides of the ball and coughing up 14–0 in a flash was one thing; refusing to go quietly, they fought tooth and nail and seemed, for a moment, on the verge of turning our touchdown attempt into nothing. We could have settled for three on a field goal—but Arkansas' defensive focus had, briefly, risen to stand on even footing with ours. And that was when the head coach made his clever choice.

He inserted defensive linemen on offense. Fourth and goal from the four. Our reserves were running a touch low on morale, while Arkansas' linebackers were riding high—so rather than awkwardly pulling a defender or two, the call seemed to be: even if they read the play, let's bulldoze them with raw force. And so Jordan Davis and Jalen Carter, defensive players to the bone, took the field to block. The two of them each swallowed two linebackers on their own, and a crease opened for Zamir to plunge through. It's the kind of thing you see only rarely watching football, and precisely because it was so rare, the field boiled ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠over.

"Those boys are gonna have trauma from that!"

"Yes—! That's exactly what I want!"

"That was beautiful, Coach! Beautiful!"

I could say it with certainty: today's game was already over. Arkansas hadn't managed to move forward at all—quite the opposite, they sat at minus-four yards, and they hadn't advanced so much as twenty-five yards toward our end zone. It wasn't that they'd steamrolled UAB or Vanderbilt because those teams were weak.

It was because we were strong. A very simple reason. Our defensive unit had the whole lot of them fenced in beyond their own front yard, standing watch.

Arkansas' third drive was more of the same. First down rush—stuffed in place. Second down pass—incomplete. And a five-yard flag on top of it. On third down they went to the extreme of a bunch formation with four wide receivers stacked to the left, but Arkansas' quarterback, his composure shattered, could do nothing at all. After Nakobe's sack, I collided chest-to-chest with him midair and roared at the defense jogging back to the sideline.

"HEY! HEY! THAT'S EXACTLY IT-!!"

"GREAT JOB!! GREAT JOB!!"

That was already their second punt from inside their own end zone today. Arkansas' offense was going that poorly. Then came the punt—and then.

Starting inside linebacker Channing Tindall squeezed himself between the punt protection unit, stretched his arm out long, and the ball glanced off his hand and dropped—right into Zamir's arms as he dove in to cradle it. A game that stood 21–0 ground its way up to 28–0, and once again we had, for all practical purposes, decided the game in the first quarter.

Sanford Stadium was burning hot. And the sideline was every bit as hot. Across two lifetimes—my past one and this one—I had never experienced a team with an atmosphere better than this Georgia squad's. It felt good to belong to this team. It felt like we could do anything. But I quickly got a grip on myself, roamed the bench with the playbook rolled up in one fist, and kept shouting at my teammates to go enjoy the game even more.

"Don't you dare let them walk out of this building!!"

Sanford had to become the opponents' nightmare. Absolutely, without exception.

Arkansas head coach Sam Pittman could not make sense of the scene unfolding before his eyes. His team was 4-0. Twice they had beaten ranked opponents. They had dispatched Rice and Georgia Southern—both written off as relative lightweights—without much trouble, taken down Texas 40–21 at home, and most recently walked out of Texas A&M with a road win. Across four games: 143 points scored, 58 allowed. The balance was sound, too. He had known winning in Sanford would be very difficult—but a blowout this total had never crossed his mind.

The only consolation, if it could be called that, was that Kirby Smart had kept Dwayne Moi Stone on the field all the way until the previous drive. Granted, it meant 17 points conceded in the fourth quarter—but this was the first time Dwayne Moi Stone had ever played a full game. Buried inside that decision was Kirby Smart's silent rebuke aimed at Brock Vandagriff, though Sam Pittman had no way of knowing that; as far as he could tell, Georgia simply rated his team highly enough to leave its best player in. But setting all of that aside—

Georgia was—

'Too strong.'

From 2016 up until the year before Dwayne Moi Stone enrolled, Sam Pittman had served as Georgia's offensive coordinator. His reviews hadn't been bad, either. After landing big recruits he became widely known to the public for the videos he posted on social media, shouting "Yesssssir-!" Precisely because of that history, the Georgia team on the field now struck him as something special. He could see for himself how formidable Todd Monken, his own replacement, was—and he had come face to face with the fact that everything about his old units, from raw talent to the tactical layer, had simply been lacking.

As the clock kept bleeding away, Arkansas failed on yet another possession, and with one minute and forty-two seconds left, Georgia sent Vandagriff onto the field. It was truly over. Georgia spent its final possession doing nothing but letting time run off the clock.

"Unbelievable."

"We got lucky, that's all."

"Ha! You call a score like this luck? You're winning the whole thing this year. Well then—good luck out there."

"Yeah."

Having shaken hands with Kirby Smart, Sam Pittman walked toward the locker room, doing his best to disguise the weight in his step. Right now, thousands of Arkansas fans were reeling from the result and hurling their vitriol—but Pittman firmly believed that before long, they too would come to see that this was nothing to be ashamed of.

The Georgia Bulldogs. Right now, they were—

'The best team in college football.'