The Wolfpacker: An Independent Magazine Covering NC State Sports
Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/337646
42 ■ THE WOLFPACKER FOOTBALL 2014 BY MATT CARTER T he 2012 preseason camp was wrap- ping up, and a marquee showdown with Tennessee in Atlanta to open NC State's season was looming. Receiver Bryan Underwood, who was a redshirt sophomore at the time, was on a mission. The fact that NCSU was preparing for a traditional SEC power like the Vols was actually not the motivation. Underwood would not have cared if the season kicked off with a lesser-known program. The receiving corps that year was a new- look one. Underwood was supposed to be a prominent piece in the equation, and he was not about to let the team down. "We were a group of guys that hardly played and had something to prove," Un- derwood said. "We had worked hard going into that season, training so hard, getting everything we needed to do down pat, and I did not want to miss being a part of that." The problem was Underwood had torn the meniscus in his knee and faced a recov- ery time of three to five weeks. That would have meant likely sitting out the first two games. Underwood told his trainers he did not want to miss any time, and he dedicated himself to a strenuous rehab that often in- cluded three workouts a day. Reflecting back, Underwood realized he saw himself grow up the most in that time period. "I needed something to open my mind up to let me know I needed to get more se- rious about what I want," Underwood said. After all, he had come a long and at times unusual way to this point. Born To Run (Fast) Underwood was always the fastest kid in the neighborhood. He chalked it up to genetics. Both his parents ran track in high school, and his siblings were noted speed- sters. By seventh grade, Underwood fig- ured why not try football. "Since I was the fastest kid in our middle school, they said, 'Hey, let's put you at run- ning back,'" he remembered. "I was prob- ably about 110 pounds playing running back in middle school." Underwood would always hear that he is too small — he enters his fifth-year senior season at NC State at 5-9, 179 pounds — but he dismissed those critics. "I always took it as a slap in my face, but I just used it as motivation to keep play- ing," he stated. Nevertheless, going into his sophomore season at University Heights (Ohio) Cleve- land Heights High, Underwood was intro- duced to new coaches who quickly said he was simply too fast and too small to play running back. He was moving to receiver. An injury kept Underwood off the field that year, but within a couple of games into his junior season, Underwood was im- pressing college recruiters. Pittsburgh was first to offer, then Cincinnati. Soon West Virginia called. Midway through the year, Underwood took a screen pass at midfield and outran three defenders that appeared to have an angle on him for a touchdown. "Ever since that one game, offers started flowing in more," Underwood recalled. NC State was one of them, but it was another school on Tobacco Road that Un- derwood saw himself at after swinging through on a visit to the Triangle schools. "I didn't really like Duke much, so I just brushed it off," he said. "I went to UNC before I came here, and they had new facilities, new indoor practice facility, everything clean, trophies everywhere, and when you're young you're thinking this is a cool school. "When I did research on them, they had a couple of guys that had good seasons — Brandon Tate and Hakeem Nicks, and all of them going to the NFL — and I was think- ing I could get into the mix with them." It did not help NC State's chances that when he visited Carter-Finley Stadium, he watched a muddy practice in the rain. "I didn't really know much about State, and comparing them … I was thinking UNC, but my coach told me told off a little bit," he remembered. "Then we started more progress about where I should go. "The thing that sold me was [NC State] was a young team. Mike [Glennon] was going to be going to his sophomore year, and Russell [Wilson] was still there. I fig- ured why not come in here and build with them, put my speed here in there where they needed me." If only it would have been that simple for Underwood. A Detour Underwood's test scores were not up to standards, a fact that he acknowledged cost him a few scholarships. He would not be enrolling with his fellow class of 2009 signees. He then met Phillip "P.J." Wilson. Wil- son had come from Houston to Cincinnati and was starting a prep school called Union Christian Academy. He wanted $9,000 for a year's tuition, but Underwood bluffed Wilson into a scholarship by telling him he had a similar option at Fork Union (Va.) Military Academy. Underwood almost immediately sensed something was fishy about Union Chris- tian, but gave it a try in the fall of 2009. His gut feeling was quickly confirmed. "I knew right away when we were stay- ing in a hotel for about three weeks and playing at a high school field, no sign of a school for us to go to, I was thinking this was not real," he said. "The place we're staying at was an abandoned boarding school which had half people living in it and half the place for us, and we were the only people in the school." Wilson was not paying bills or even his assistant coaches. "The guy is a habitual liar," one assis- tant, Anthony Johnson, told The Cincinnati Enquirer. "P.J. Wilson is a con man." The only real teacher Underwood re- membered was Mary Ems, who had been fired from Winton Woods High in Cincin- nati for having sex with a student and was forced to surrender her teaching license. After five games, police got involved and the school was effectively shut down. There was one valuable lesson Underwood received, though. An assistant gave him some pointers on taking the SAT. They worked, and around Christmas time Under- wood learned he had a sufficient score to enroll at NCSU. He arrived in the summer of 2010. "That was probably one of the best gifts I got for Christmas, knowing I was going to get to go to college for free," he said. Wilson would be convicted of theft for A LONG WAY Speedy Fifth-Year Senior Receiver Bryan Underwood Overcame Obstacles To Succeed At NC State Underwood pulled down a touchdown recep- tion in each of the first eight games in 2012, the longest such streak in NC State history and one shy of the ACC record held by Herman Moore of Virginia. PHOTO BY KEN MARTIN 42-44.Bryan Underwood.indd 42 6/27/14 11:53 AM