Eagles’ ‘Uncle Craig’ Back (Daily News-Record)

BC’s Smith missed 2005 season with an injury

Daily News-Record - By Jeremy Cothran

BRIDGEWATER — The first time this summer that linebacker Craig Smith donned his shoulder pads, there was still that twinge of trepidation, the cautious voice in the back of his mind offering a constant reminder of last year’s nightmare.

Psst. Hey Craig. Remember me? You’ve been down this road before, and you weren’t even touched last time. I could be back at any time. Don’t sleep on me.

At the start of Bridgewater College preseason football practice last year, Smith was participating in a drill and blocking the quarterback while ex-safety Adrian Herndon was returning an interception. He felt a sharp stab of pain in the back of his foot, almost like he had been inadvertently kicked.

Turns out, it was a torn Achilles tendon. He was out for the season.

"I’ll be honest with you," Smith said outside the team’s locker room at Nininger Hall after practice Wednesday. "It was hard for me. The first day that we put on pads, and I’ve never been a nervous guy, but I was nervous. It was very much in my mind. I definitely think about it a lot."

You can’t blame Smith for tiptoeing through his first contact drill. Last year was supposed to be his swan song, anchoring an Eagles’ defense that was stacked with talented, athletic upperclassmen.

Smith’s absence not only created a gaping hole at the middle linebacker position, but an enormous void in terms of team leadership. The 5-foot-9, 207-pound defensive captain knows when to get in a teammate’s face, when to pick him up, where to make the defensive calls and how to keep emotions in check. It wasn’t a roster spot that Eagles’ coach Michael Clark could easily pencil someone into.

"He’s a voice," BC defensive coordinator Grant Higgison said, "that everyone listens and respects. He can go and do what needs to be done as a leader. His value is in intangibles. You can’t put any value on that."

Higgison is elated to have Smith back in the fold because he feels the linebacker will help galvanize a defense that was ravaged by seven departures. Smith believes that the Eagles "D," has a chance to get some much-needed swagger back after allowing 328 points last season.

"It’s a pass-happy league now," Smith said, referring to the Old Dominion Athletic Conference. "Everyone wants to pass the ball and there are going to be a lot of big plays, lots of explosive plays. …We’ll get a lot better. You’ll see some explosion from us."

Off the field, Smith has a similar infectious impact on his teammates, most of who refer to the 23-year old Virginia Beach native as "Grandpa," or "Uncle Craig."

Need advice on school, girls, life or football? The therapist is in.

Said outside linebacker Brandon Borst, who took over Smith’s position last year after the injury: "Well, he is a little old. He’s a lot older than me. In fact, he’s just an old looking dude. He’s wise beyond his years, man."

Borst also pointed to last season’s opener against McDaniel – a game that the Eagles lost 36-35 – as a true barometer of Smith’s value.

"We don’t lose that game if he’s there," Borst said. "We let it slip away. We were missing that leadership, and you can’t just go and replace that."

It’s also Smith’s industrious personality that wears off on teammates. Undersized for his position, Smith’s success is born of hard work, Clark said.

"Craig Smith is one of those that maximized his talent," Clark said. "A topped-out athlete. More importantly, when we recruited him and I went and visited with his high school coach [at Kellam] he said, ‘This is the guy that you want in the locker room. When doors are shut and backs are turned, he’s going to be saying the right things to the right people.’"

Coaches also credited Smith for getting his roommate, Winston Young, involved in his summer conditioning sessions. After last season, Young weighed 190 pounds. Thanks to a dedicated offseason lifting weights with Smith, he’s bulked up to 218 pounds of what he termed "solid muscle."

"There are days when I didn’t feel like getting up," the senior tailback said. "But there would be Craig pounding on my door. He would always be yelling, ‘You can sleep later.’ He motivates me to be better than what I was."

One obvious concern is whether or not Smith will be able to retain his sideline-to-sideline speed, but he’s not too worried.

"Our trainers here are the best," he said. "It was crazy the things I was trying to do to get back in into it. They had me bouncing on my right Achilles, pushing me farther than I thought I could go. Rehab is tough, but it’s getting my body back where it needs to be."

The real test comes Sept. 2, when BC opens the season at McDaniel.