King has big game, big obligation; he's right for both

For the first time in five weeks, Old Dominion's Chad King has a football game to play Saturday. 

The Monarchs' second-leading quarterback-sacker believes his fractured right fibula is strong enough for him to help his mates chase Norfolk State's Chris Walley through the playoff afternoon at Foreman Field.

If King believes it, I have to believe it's true, and not only because he could squish me between his fingers. It's because I believe the United States Army doesn't train people to make important decisions draped in emotion or adrenaline.

After all, King's immediate military future as a commissioned second lieutenant depends on him emerging unbroken from this final stretch of college football, however long it lasts for the Monarchs.

"They don't want you to go in hurt, so the biggest worry was breaking the leg again and that becoming an issue, as far as surgery or getting screws in it," said King, 22, a defensive end from Springfield and 1 of 300 students in ODU's Army ROTC program.

"That worry still lingers in the back of my mind, but I'm not too worried about it. I'm going to play in an air cast to prevent the chance of it happening again."

Little wonder, considering King's broken the same bone twice while at ODU. So, out of respect for the Army fitness test that will require his large body, listed at 6-foot-3 and 255 pounds, to run 2 miles in 16-1/2 minutes, King decided to stick around campus another semester to fully heal and train.

He pushed back his graduation date - he's a marketing major - from next month to May, along with it his fitness test until sometime in the spring.

Mature call.

King, whose father is a retired Army colonel and his mother his high school's principal, became known for such things in his four years at ODU after one year at ODU. Ohio Dominican University, that is.

He attended the latter, then an NAIA football school, because it recruited him hard out of Mt. Vernon High. But when he found that ODU a bad fit, King followed friends to Norfolk, high school highlight video in hand, and landed a chance to walk onto ODU's formulating team.

Three seasons later, ODU coach Bobby Wilder, who has called King "the definition of leadership and character," hopes King gets another chance at home to prove his praise.

"It would be very important to our football team if Chad could play," Wilder said. "He's such an emotional leader of this team. Our players have a tremendous amount of respect for what he's accomplished as a human being."

With 4-1/2 sacks, and despite missing four games, King is second on the team to Ronnie Cameron's 6-1/2. As good as his rush skills are, King drops athletically enough in pass coverage to draw NFL eyes.

That is, pro scouts that pass through ODU's football building make sure to have an introductory sit-down with King, despite his pressing six-year military commitment.

If it comes to a pro opportunity, King said there are things that could be done about that complication, but for now he's filed it under "wait and see."

"I'm still on the fence about if I want to do my pro day (workout) next semester, or if I just want to say, 'Well, I already have this Army thing, so I'm just gonna go with that,' " King said. "I'll talk to my family about it. It'll get processed."

Here's what I believe about King: he'll make a wise choice.

Tom Robinson, (757) 446-2518 or tom.robinson@pilotonline.com

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