The Wolfpacker: An Independent Magazine Covering NC State Sports
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JULY 2015 ■ 47 FOOTBALL PREVIEW 2015 BY MATT CARTER K atie Sheridan, NC State's interim director for academic support, ap- proached Wolfpack fifth-year se- nior defensive end Mike Rose in January with a request: Would you speak at the graduation banquet for student-athletes in May? No big deal, Rose thought. So much so that Rose admittedly did not pay much at- tention to the assignment until the date was rapidly approaching. "About two weeks before, I was like, 'Oh, I've got to write a speech,'" Rose remembered. Rose wrote an opening paragraph and highlighted key points he wanted to make, but he decided that the speech should come from the heart, and in doing so he managed to capture his pre-, current and hopefully post-Wolfpack lives in a nutshell. Small-Town Boy Rose, sporting a black bow tie and blue- gray buttoned-down shirt with his sleeves rolled up, began his speech by thanking his "beautiful mother and grandmother for raising me." It is through his mother, Rose believes, that he has the outgoing-personality that allows him to be at ease in front of a crowd. The Raleigh News and Observer NC State beat writer Joe Giglio once quipped on Twitter that Rose should provide lessons to his classmate and NCSU quarterback Jacoby Brissett on how to be more open during a press conference. Rose was taught never to bite his tongue, he said, unless you feel uneasy about what you are about to say. His upbringing, first in Lake City, S.C., and then beginning at age 10, in Fountain Inn, S.C., also forced him to be social. "Where I am from, there is nothing to do but talk to people," Rose noted. "I didn't get a phone until I was 16 years old. I don't even have any social media. If you are go- ing to meet me, you are going to have to meet me." Lake City, as Rose joked in his speech, is "really small, you're not going to find it." In 2000, fewer than 7,000 people lived in the town that if you went out of the way to locate would be found near Florence, S.C. Fountain Inn, which is near Greenville, is similarly populated. For youths like Rose, attending college was not in the plans for most of them. Rose said that most of them eventually either work in a local steel mill or factory, or worse, they end up in jail. "I honestly never thought I would be go- ing to college," Rose said. "Football defi- nitely saved my life. It helped me get to where I am today." Finding Football During his speech, Rose recalled a recent conversation he had with one of his friends, Javarius Conway, at Hillcrest High School. Conway was the team's tight end. After graduation, he attended Greenville Techni- cal College for two years before moving on to real-world responsibilities. "He was telling me about some struggles he was having after high school," Rose noted. "He's about to get married, taxes, he was just telling me how blessed I was to be taken out of this situation and be where I was getting a four-year degree." Rose came close not to getting to NC State, though. One simple conversa- tion before his freshman year with Hillcrest High School's then-head football coach, Andy Hallman, would change the trajec- tory of Rose's life. At that point, Rose summed up that he was going through a lot of phases, and it was during one disciplinary stage that Hall- man approached Rose. "You don't know me, and I don't know you, but you're six-foot and only 13 years old," Hallman said. "So I want you to come out here and play football for me. If you play football, get better grades, you'll have a chance to play in college one day. "I will help keep you out of trouble. I'll keep you from getting expelled." Truth be told, Rose was more interested in what Hallman said at the end. "I was like as long as I don't get ex- pelled I'll go out here and pretend to play football," Rose stated. "I didn't care about playing. I just wanted to stay out of trouble cause my mom was going to kick me out to military school." The 6-0, 165-pound freshman with good speed found natural football abilities within himself. When two older players lining up at outside linebacker got hurt, Rose was starting game one. Before long, Maryland linebackers coach Al Seamonson was stop- ping by Rose's high school specifically for him. Rose's reaction to that at the time? He laughed. "I was like, 'Wow, seriously?'" Rose remembered. Rose now had his way out of the some- times difficult, rural, small-town life in South Carolina. He bluntly admitted that without football he could very well have ended up in jail. Instead, he had numerous major offers to play college football. At one point, Texas was pursuing him before cancelling his of- fer. South Carolina asked him to wait to see what eventual No. 1 overall NFL Draft pick Jadeveon Clowney would do. Rose still had his options. Louisville and Maryland pursued him, and he made an official visit to Wake Forest. Rose's reac- tion to his first trip was probably typical of many small-town athletes. "I was like, 'Oh it's college football, I love it,'" Rose recalled. He verbally com- mitted to the Deacs, but he decided to take more visits, including to NCSU. In the final analysis, Rose realized that he was a Wolfpacker in heart, and signed with State. "It was liberating on my end because I didn't think it was ever going to happen," Rose said. Working His Way Up Rose remembers passing by cows while he walked to school growing up. Need- less to say, moving to Raleigh required an FINDING A PATH Fifth-Year Senior Defensive End Mike Rose Credits Football With Turning His Life Around Last season, Rose notched 46 tackles, a team- best 14 stops for loss, five sacks, five quarter- back hurries, two forced fumbles, two passes broken up and a fumble recovery in 11 starts. PHOTO BY KEN MARTIN "I honestly never thought I would be going to college. Football definitely saved my life. It helped me get to where I am today." ■ Rose