He was born on fourth-and-long. Mom drank when she was pregnant with him. Traded sex for drugs while he was in diapers. State authorities dragged him out of a crack house closet when he was 4 years old. Threw Mom in prison. Dad? Dead before the kid met him.
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Speaking of alumni offspring who got away, all-state tight end Brian O'Neill of Salesianum School in Wilmington, Del., is headed to the University of Pittsburgh on a football scholarship. The 6-7, 250-pound O'Neill's athleticism was on display this winter when he was named the Delaware Boys Player of the Year after leading Salesianum to its first state DIAA basketball championship.O'Neill's father Brendan was a running back on the 1970 and '71 Dartmouth teams that went a combined 17-1. His three-yard run provided the only touchdown in the epic 1970 showdown at Yale Bowl that saw the Big Green beat nationally ranked Yale, 10-0, in a battle of undefeated and nationally ranked teams played in front of a crowd topping 60,000. Brendan O'Neill is now the head public defender for the state of Delaware. John Carney '78, an All-Ivy corner for the Big Green and now a U.S. Congressman from Delaware, is an uncle of the Pitt tight end-to-be.
By the way, Sports Illustrated's SI Vault has a story spun out of the 1970 game here.
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As long as we're on the subject of talented legacy athletes, completing his ice hockey career at Yale last week was 6-2, 207 defenseman Gus Young, son of Kevin Young '77, linebacker and captain of the '76 team and a football, wrestling and lacrosse standout at Dartmouth. Uncle Wayne Young '72 – the longtime voice of Dartmouth football and now baseball – played with Brendan O'Neill in the legendary '70 Yale game and captained the Big Green a year later.Gus Young, who helped Yale to the NCAA Championship a year ago, was a Colorado Avalanche draft choice. Find a story about Young and his senior classmates here. His brother Seamus, by the way, was a standout skater at Princeton who went on to play in the ECHL.
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Speaking of legacies, there's a tough and talented 6-7 high school junior sitting on Big Ten and ACC scholarship offers who has very, very close ties to the Big Green. The really scary news, though, is that in November he took an unofficial visit to . . . wait for it . . . Harvard. That said, he's been on the Dartmouth campus many times.
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Perhaps the most high-profile athletic legacies who got away in recent years are Super Bowl quarterback Russell Wilson, son of Harry '77, and Atlanta Braves outfielder Jason Heyward, whose parents Eugene and Laura (Benjamin) are both grads. Eugene Heyward '81 was a three-year basketball letterwinner for Dartmouth.
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The Sports Network has a column headlined, 25 FCS names to know for the NFL draft. Not surprisingly, the Ivy Leaguers featured at Cornell quarterback Jeff Mathews and Princeton defensive tackle Caraun Reid.
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PennLive had a great quote from new Penn State football coach James Franklin on the first day of spring practice:"There is no walking on the field ever. I told them the first day if you don't know where you're supposed to go or what you're doing when the horn blows, then sprint in a circle until you figure it out."
