'Your papers, please' must never be heard in America
Still digesting his team's 1-3 start, Navy coach Ken Niumatalolo stepped onto a practice field just a short walk from the banks of the Severn River in early October.
It isn't easy to free up even a half-hour during preseason football camp. Whenever he can, Navy offensive lineman Bradyn Heap knows the best way to utilize it is scouring as much video as possible.
Travis Bridges sat in an offensive line meeting in March, unaware that the latest unforeseen twist in his young life was about to unfold.
This early August practice session was supposed to be fairly uneventful for David Sumrall. Locked into a competition for Navy's left tackle position, Sumrall was in the middle of what coaches would later say was one of his best practices with the Midshipmen.
"He said 'Coach Niumat, we're doing a lot of things right, we have to stay the course even if the tide doesn't turn right away,'" Niumatalolo recalled. "I just looked and I smiled. I needed that talk, too."
"He said, 'I told my son never to talk to strangers, and you're a stranger.'
