Thursday, December 21, 2006
Hokies eager to see old buddies
Randy King
Randy King's Tech Insider is exclusive to roanoke.com and is posted by 5 p.m. Thursdays in season.
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One reason many of the older Virginia Tech football players are excited about playing in the Dec. 30 Chick-fill-A Bowl is the chance to visit and hang out with the ex-Hokies playing for the NFL’s Atlanta Falcons.
Three of the most decorated players in Tech history -- Michael Vick, DeAngelo Hall and Jimmy Williams -- and guard Matt Lehr dot the Falcons’ roster these days.
Hall, a Pro Bowl cornerback selection for the second straight season, has made plans for many of the Tech players to visit his palatial estate one evening during the team’s bowl stay.
"Oh, yeah, we’re definitely going to go visit with the former players and see how they’re living," junior defensive tackle Carlton Powell said. "Hey, those guys are living the dream, man.
"I’ve heard a whole lot about DeAngelo’s house. It’s a big mansion, man. I’ve heard he’s got like a mile from the fence, where you turn off the road, to the house. I’ve heard he’s got a fish tank the size of a wall ... I’ve heard he’s got TVs everywhere ... and he’s got a lot of cars. Who knows? Maybe I might get to test drive some!"
Junior linebacker Xavier Adibi sounded as stoked as Powell about checking out Hall’s high-dollar crib.
"I’ve seen pictures of the place and it’s unreal," Adibi said. "It’s amazing. I can’t wait to go there."
Obviously, senior linebacker Brenden Hill couldn’t wait to get to Atlanta. While the rest of his teammates headed home for the Christmas break Tuesday, Hill was packing his bags for a plane flight to the Big A. He wanted to get to town early to spend a few days with his close pal, Williams.
"I’m going to hang out with Jimmy a few nights," Hill said. "I saw my family at graduation [last Friday] and they’ll be at he bowl game. So it’s not like I’m missing a lot back home.
"I wanted to get there a few days before the bowl game and go out with no curfew. I just want to get all that out of the way. Once our team gets there [Sunday], I want to kind to be out of that mode. I have a good feeling about this game and I just want everybody to be focused on what we have at hand."
Hill will stay at Williams’ new four-bedroom home. He said the visit is as much for Williams’ sake as his.
"Y’all know Jimmy," said Hill, laughing. "I just want to be around him so I can help calm him down, take some ease off him and help him take some stuff off his mind.
"I told Jimmy that he needs a girl or something, he needs a wife, someone just to calm him down and get him focused on something. I pick with him all the time. All of us have different personalities, but he’s definitely the firecracker ... the ‘let’s go, let’s do this’ ... I always call him ‘the wide-open one.’
"His Dad told me Jimmy needs to get a dog ... something to get him to just calm down a little bit and not having his mind wandering in a million different directions. Hey, when you’re 22 years old and you have a lot of money, and you’re living in a four-bedroom, huge house by yourself, your mind can wander.
"He’ll definitely keep me on my toes. We’re going to be there to the end with each other. People can say it sounds like a formula for disaster, but I’m confident we’ve all come a long way. We know what’s at stake, we know what we’re doing. So if something happens, I guess y’all can go back to this quote and say, ‘I blew it.’ "
The team curfew will be 2 a.m. Sunday night. The deadline for players to be in their Marriott Marquis hotel rooms will be will moved up 30 minutes each night thereafter.
Report to your room late from a night out on the town and you’re subject to be hauled to the local Greyhound bus station for a one-way ticket home. Don’t believe it, just ask current strength and conditioning graduate assistant Keith Short. At the 1995 Sugar Bowl, Short missed the team curfew and soon found himself being hustled to the bus depot for a 18-hour ride from New Orleans to his home in Richmond.
"They always tell us when we get there that it’s a long ride home on the Greyhound," Hill said. "They tell the Keith Short story year in and year out, and I believe them. So, hopefully, our young guys will take heed to that. I think the seniors will do a good job making sure that everybody abides by the rules."
Hill said he’s going to warn some of the younger players about the pitfalls of night time in the big city.
"A lot of guys think Atlanta is going to be this great place and ‘I’m going to do this.’ But Atlanta is a big city and you have to have your wits about you if you’re going to be involved in anything and doing anything. If you don’t have the confidence and wherewithal to handle yourself, you might get swallowed.
"I’m glad we have the curfew. It’s kind of disappointing that it continues to go down day-by-day, but we’re focused on Georgia and we really want to win this game and be 11-2."
Two years ago at the Sugar Bowl, Tech lost 16-13 to an Auburn team that operated without a curfew.
"I was talking to Cornell Brown [Hokies graduate assistant coach] and he was saying if it was up to him that he would give us no curfew the first few nights, let us get it out of the way, and then knock our curfew way back the rest of the week," Hill said.
Hill laughed and duly noted: "I thought it might be a good idea ... besides the fact that guys really might go wild down there."
