ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, September 1, 1996 TAG: 9609030124
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: LEXINGTON
SOURCE: DANIEL UTHMAN STAFF WRITER
The Baltimore Ravens like Thomas Haskins.
The NFL team sent one of its college scouting assistants, George Kokinis, to VMI this past week. Kokinis was there to look at Haskins, a Division I-AA All-America running back about to begin his final collegiate season.
On this particular day, the Keydets were holding an intrasquad scrimmage. Haskins, 23, made a series of signature runs down the Alumni Memorial Field grass. He whizzed down a sideline, as so many pictures have captured in recent years. He ripped through the defensive line as he has done to so many of the Keydets' better opponents.
He didn't know the pros were watching. Haskins always conducts himself as if a future employer is watching.
Kokinis walked over to Lance Fujiwara, VMI's athletic trainer, who was standing near an end zone. After a couple of questions about Haskins' speed, strength and medical history, Kokinis popped the big one.
``How tall is he?''
Unsung, unwanted
Thomas Haskins never groans or gripes. He used to whine a little (a lot, according to his older brother Doug). But when he hears stories like the one above, he can't help but roll his eyes and sigh.
Haskins has run away from the best defenses in NCAA Division I-AA, but he can't shake the too-small label, no matter how huge his feats and accomplishments. A 5-foot-8, 178-pound native of Richmond, Haskins was a first-team AP Division I-AA All-American and Southern Conference offensive player of the year in 1995. He owns five of the top six rushing and all-purpose running games in VMI history. He became the Keydets' all-time leading rusher as a junior, and has 3,651 yards on 612 carries, for nearly a 6-yards-per-carry average.
At his current pace, Haskins will finish among the top five rushers in I-AA history.
Despite the numbers, all anybody saw when he was a senior at Highland Springs High School in Henrico County was the ``5-8, 155'' on his physical evaluation form. They ignored his rushing totals that led the Springers for three seasons. They ignored a touchdown burst in the 1992 Virginia High School League playoffs against Lloyd C. Bird of Chesterfield in which Haskins moved so fast, he ran out of a shoe. They didn't ignore a score on the Scholastic Aptitude Test that didn't automatically qualify him for freshman eligibility.
That score turned into an excuse to postpone Haskins' heartbreak. His brother Doug, his high school coach, Rudy Ward, and coaches from James Madison University told him to go to Fork Union Military Academy for a year of prep school. After a year at Fork Union, during which his score jumped and he made the dean's list, Haskins still had no Division I-A takers. He understood that. The University of Virginia wasn't at the top of his list anyway, but JMU didn't want him either.
``I really, truly wanted to be a Duke,'' Haskins said. ``To be put down the way I was twice was unbelievable. They gave me advice to go to Fork Union and said that they would pick me up.
``That backfired. They didn't keep their word on that. It was a hard blow, but I'm just grateful for where I'm at.''
John Shuman, Fork Union's coach, helped Haskins get to VMI. A former Keydets defensive tackle, Shuman showcased Haskins when VMI's recruiters came around. Then-coach Jim Schuck liked the way Haskins thrived in a one-on-two drill (``He was just unloading on them,'' Shuman said), but raised the same old concerns about his size.
``I told him, `This frame, I will work on,''' Haskins said. ``I kept my word.''
Parental guidance
Thomas Haskins never expected to be a big person. His father, Tom, is 5-7. His mother and best friend, Jane, is 5-1. His two older brothers, Tony and Doug, are each 5-6. But when he was growing up, Thomas acted his size.
``He was the baby,'' said Doug Haskins, 31. ``Whenever Tony and I were going anywhere, he'd whine and say, `Can I go?' We'd say, `We told you, no!' and crack him upside the head.''
Thomas always retreated to his mother, a tendency he still exhibits today. According to his teammate and roommate on football trips, Jabarr Bean, Haskins calls her the night before every game. Mother and son take two or three trips to Atlantic City, N.J., each year. Because Tom Haskins always has had to work the ``B shift'' at the Philip Morris plant in Richmond, it was Jane's job to make Thomas' lunch and drive him to practice.
Admittedly old fashioned, Jane Haskins prides herself on the fact that no girls have set foot in Thomas' room. Haskins' girlfriend, Monika Taylor of Richmond, knows to go to the living room whenever she comes over. No matter that she's been Thomas' girlfriend for 11 years. Rules are rules.
``If I have to get on him about anything,'' Jane Haskins said, ``there's no pouting or anything.''
The pouting and whining stopped by the time Thomas Haskins was a student at Fork Union. He says that was where he made the leap into maturity. But the way schools were ignoring him, Haskins had another reason to complain.
Doug Haskins didn't allow it. It was during a short drive to breakfast at an east Richmond Aunt Sarah's Pancake House that Doug, a Marine for 12 years, made his point.
``Going to VMI made sense,'' Doug Haskins said.
After a year there, staying at VMI didn't.
Year of the rat
At VMI, all freshmen, known as ``rats,'' face great odds in their first 1 1/2 semesters on post. Upperclassmen are in their face all the time. After a full day of classes and marching, rats are awakened from their brief slumber for ``sweat parties,'' five-mile runs that culminate in a massive group shower by garden hose.
Each rat is assigned a big brother, known as a ``dike,'' to help them through the toughest times. Haskins, the second-string tailback, was assigned Rob Clark, VMI's first-stringer in 1993. At times, the on-field competition bled over to the barracks. Haskins wasn't getting the support he needed. ``Frustrating,'' is how Haskins put it.
Adding to his uncertainty was Schuck's firing on Dec.7, 1993. Schuck had abandoned the run-oriented wishbone offense in the middle of the season, and soon after that Haskins rushed for 224 yards against The Citadel, a game Haskins calls ``the turning point.''
Other schools finally started looking at him. Haskins looked back. He was considering transferring to another program and decided to speak with Davis Babb, VMI's athletic director. Babb asked him to give VMI another chance. He also asked Haskins to serve on a committee that would select VMI's next football coach.
Bill Stewart was an assistant at Air Force who had tried to get the head coach's job at VMI on two previous occasions. He was hired when Thomas Haskins offered his help. It didn't exactly make sense (Stewart's background was in the wishbone), but as Babb now says when he remembers looking at Haskins listen to Stewart: ``A light came on. I wish I could have captured that moment.''
Among other things, Stewart told Haskins he needed him to carry the ball 25 times a game for the team to win. He worked with Napoleon McCallum at Navy and Amos Lawrence, Kelvin Bryant and Derrick Fenner at North Carolina, all of whom amassed a lot of carries in their careers. He saw similar potential in Haskins, but he had to recruit him back into the program.
``When I was closing,'' Stewart said, ``I looked right at him and I said, `I can tell you what. I've never seen you on film, but if you're as good as I think you are, we've got to have you. VMI's got to have you.
``You've got to give me a chance to prove myself. Just stay a semester and if you don't like it, I'll help you transfer wherever you want to go.'''
At that moment, Haskins decided he wasn't going anywhere but back over to post. Meanwhile, Stewart walked away with Babb and other search committee members. ``Well, what'd you think?'' they asked Stewart.
Stewart responded, ``Well, he's not very big, but he doesn't have to be. He's powerful.''
That was what made Stewart different, and that is what cemented Haskins' commitment to the program and the institute. True, Stewart had noticed his slight stature. But he was the first not to question it.
Growth spurt
Although Haskins and Stewart have come to know each other well during the past 2 1/2 years, there is one thing the coach doesn't understand about the player.
``The only time we fight is when he doesn't clean his plate,'' Stewart said. ``He's the pickiest eater I ever saw for a football player.''
Stewart said he doesn't understand how a person who doesn't even eat bread (which Haskins does not) could be so muscular. Haskins said it seems like all he ever eats is fish and chicken. He loves McDonald's, but only for the french fries and McNuggets. A hamburger's OK, but please, hold the bun.
His hatred of bread began when he was a child, and Doug and Tony would ball up slices of white bread and show them to Thomas under the table, at which point he would immediately cry to his parents.
``I'm just a strange person,'' Haskins said.
He's also a person people at VMI look to - and not just to make statements on the field. Whenever Stewart wants to present an honorary ball to a prominent figure at VMI, whether it's superintendent Maj. Gen. Josiah Bunting III or Col. Don Jamison, professor emeritus of civil engineering, Haskins serves as toastmaster. This past week, Babb called on Haskins to go to the VMI hospital and speak with a freshman tennis player from California who didn't think he could make it at VMI.
``He's been a leader from day one,'' Stewart said. ``We owe him a lot for what he bought into. And the institute has been very, very good to Thomas Haskins. It's brought out the most wonderful people skills and really polished him as a human being.''
Haskins doesn't mind those responsibilities. Those are not weights to bear.
He leaves the real lifting to the VMI weight room. Before preseason practice began, he squat-lifted 500 pounds, nearly three times his weight. The same day he bench-pressed nearly twice his weight, 340 pounds.
It's as if he's running out of space on his body for muscles. But every VMI cadet could use a suit of armor, particularly this one, who has carried the ball 506 times in the past two years.
He's had one injury; a piece of bone was removed from his right knee 12 days before the 1995 opener at Richmond. Haskins had a subpar outing that day (12 rushes for 29 yards), prompting Stewart to threaten to redshirt him. Haskins told him he'd be fine. The next week, he was, scoring four touchdowns and gaining 186 yards in a 50-31 victory over Liberty.
``He doesn't give people a good shot at him,'' said Donnie Ross, VMI's running backs coach.
Haskins wants to be a symbol for small football players. He made it; so can they. ``There's more to it than height,'' he said. ``You have to judge a person by his courage.''
Since he has been at VMI, Haskins has had a pet passion: He closely watches running backs at the Division I-A level, comparing himself with them. He flips through magazines and sees Kevin Faulk at Louisiana State, a player recruited nationally who is almost the same size as he.
``When I go against Marshall and all those schools I had an interest in,'' he said, ``I'm going to show they made a mistake in not recruiting me.''
In the spring of 1995, when VMI's track team went to Tallahassee, Fla., for the Florida State Relays, Haskins made sure he was on the roster. The Seminoles' football team was in the midst of spring drills.
Haskins' main motivation in making the trip was to see Warrick Dunn, Florida State's tailback and a leading contender for the Heisman Trophy. His thoughts upon seeing Dunn practice? ``Warrick Dunn is no bigger than I am,'' Haskins said.
Even Heisman Trophy contenders such as Dunn aren't always at the top of the most-wanted lists in the NFL if they don't have the size. Ross, whose VMI alumnus brother Bobby coaches the NFL's San Diego Chargers, has told Haskins the NFL thinks the bigger, the better.
``It'll be tough for him to make a roster in the NFL,'' Donnie Ross said. ``Once he gets an opportunity to show it, he'll make a lasting impression. They're going to have to find out for themselves and not by reading a stat book.
``A lot of people made that mistake before, and it looks like a lot will make that mistake again.''
LENGTH: Long : 218 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: 1. ROGER HART/Staff VMI coach Bill Stewart on Thomasby CNBHaskins: ``He's been a leader from day one. We owe him a lot for
what he bought into. And the institute has been very, very good to
Thomas Haskins.'' 2. DON PETERSEN/Staff VMI's Thomas Haskins is on
pace to finish among the top five rushers in NCAA
Division I-AA history. color.