Backup wide receiver Thomas Wilson joins list of Navy heroes in Army-Navy series - capitalgazette.com

 

Backup wide receiver joins list of Navy heroes in series

Mids' Wilson comes up big with kick recovery

 

By Bill Wagner, [email protected]

10:27 a.m. EST, December 15, 2014

 

One of the biggest challenges for a player participating in the Army-Navy game is to block out all the distractions and focus only on what happens on the field.

 

Navy's coaching staff has done a good job of preaching that mantra during the current 13-game winning streak against its archrival. In footage filmed prior to last year's Army-Navy game in Philadelphia, head coach Ken Niumatalolo can be heard imploring his troops to not get caught up in the atmosphere within the stadium.

 

"Do your job," Niumatalolo bellowed, enunciating each word. "Don't worry about the crowd of anything else. Just do your job."

 

Those words must have echoed inside Thomas Wilson's head on Saturday evening as he took the field along with Navy's kickoff return team. Kicker Daniel Grochowski had just booted a 52-yard field goal to pull Army within a touchdown and now Navy needed to regain possession in order to salt away the remaining time.

 

Trailing 17-10 with 1:51 left, the Black Knights were forced to attempt an onside kick and head coach Jeff Monken sent out a specialist to perform the task. Cale Brewer had handled kickoffs for Army during the game, but Mitchell Howard has worked all season to perfect the onside kick.

 

"He's been the guy all year. We work on it every week, a couple times a week, to prepare for that situation," Monken said.

 

Monken served as special teams coordinator under head coach Paul Johnson at Georgia Southern, Navy and Georgia Tech.

 

"I'm very involved in the special teams and I try to cover as much as I can to make sure there are no situations that come up that we are not prepared for," he said.

 

Monken's attention to the specialty units showed through early in the Army-Navy game when he rushed 10 men (everyone except the returner) when Navy punter Pablo Beltran was backed up on the goal line.

 

It was a jail break with multiple Army players getting deep penetration and sophomore safety Josh Jenkins easily blocked Beltran's attempt. Sophomore wide receiver Xavier Moss grabbed the loose ball and returned it seven yards for a touchdown to give the Black Knights a 7-0 lead.

 

Steve Johns serves as special teams coordinator for Navy, which divides the responsibility of overseeing the various units among other assistants. Danny O'Rourke is in charge of the "hands" team, which is sent out whenever an onside kick seems likely. Comprised entirely of wide receivers and slot backs, the "hands" team is responsible for manning the front line of the kickoff return unit in such situations.

 

"We work on it every Thursday in practice. I lined up in my position and watched the ball real closely like we're taught," Wilson said. "Coach O'Rourke always tells us to expect the ball to come to you, to want the ball and to go get it."

 

Howard certainly did his job well, delivering an absolute beauty of an onside kick. The left-footed kicker drilled the top of the football just right in order to get it bouncing off the turf at M&T Bank Stadium.

 

"I thought he made a great kick and gave us a chance," Monken said. "We were a little bit late getting to the first guy from the sideline who recovered the ball, but I thought he did a heck of a job to give us a chance to get the ball back."

 

Howard's kick bounced twice before traveling the mandatory 10 yards before it can be fielded. The second bounce was particularly high and that is when Wilson made his move, stepping forward and leaping to snare the ball out of midair.

 

"Coach O'Rourke always tells us to get it on the high bounce so you don't get short-hopped," Wilson said. "I saw the ball go high so I went up and attacked it."

 

Wilson did well to hang onto the ball as he got hit hard in the lower body by an onrushing Army defender. And with that, the backup wide receiver from Brandenburg, Kentucky etched his name into history as one of the heroes of the Army-Navy game.

 

"It was exciting to have a role in the victory. It was a great team win. The defense played great the whole way and the offense made plays when it had to," Wilson said. "We had a special teams play go against us earlier in the game so we had to make up for that at the end."

Very nice article.

 

Go ARMY in '15!

Play starts on the 2:00 minute mark