Shea Campbell, the tenacious WVU linebacker who plays his last game as a Mountaineer today against TCU, never did say if he actually liked the movie.
“Hey, kid! You’re not supposed to be here.”
“Hey, this place is really something, huh? Someday, I’m gonna come out of that tunnel and I’m gonna run onto this field.”
“Well, it ain’t gonna be on this day.”
“I’m here to play football for the Irish.”
“Coach Parseghian know about it?”
“No. Not yet.”
“Well maybe you best tell him first.”
Life, imitating art, imitating life
Sure, you recognize the above dialogue.
It’s from “Rudy” — the big-hearted, 1993 movie based on the real-life story of Daniel “Rudy” Ruetigger, America’s favorite college football walk-on.
Rudy was played in the film by Sean Astin (Patty Duke’s kid, for you readers of a certain vintage), who captured his undersized earnestness perfectly.
His haplessness, too.
Mr. Ruetigger, unfortunately, didn’t have a prayer of really playing for storied Notre Dame.
He just didn’t have the physical talent to match what was emotionally beating in his gridiron heart, though he tried.
God bless him, he really did.
His prayer, though, was answered.
Technically.
The walk-on worked and worked, earning the respect and admiration of Ara Parseghian, the school’s head football coach who could be statesmanlike and evangelical, at the same time.
Rudy turned himself into a tackling dummy and punching bag on the practice team.
The football martyr suffered, died and was buried every day during drills.
By his senior year, Parseghian was gone, but his teammates lobbied for him.
They wanted him to be a Fighting Irishman, for real, on the last game of the season and of what passed for a football career.
Dan Devine, the new coach, despite his portrayal as a heavy in the movie, lived up to his religious-sounding last name for Rudy.
The walk-on finally got to run on that field. The final play, in the final game, of the 1976 season.
What happened next wasn’t the Hollywood version by which you suspend your disbelief.
It really happened, with the surviving highlight reel to back it up.
As the stadium clock ticked to zero, Rudy skirted the backfield to sack the quarterback.
Campbell was a walk-on, too.
In terms of the movie, that’s the only thing Messrs. Shea and Rudy have in common.
Because No. 34 of the Mountaineers never had to work at it to play football.
The best of the Mohigans
Campbell roared out of Morgantown High School, a quick-stepping, wiry bruiser on both sides of the football.
He made All-State as a running back and safety for the Mohigans.
His Hudl reel was out there for his MHS senior year in 2015, and while plenty of Division II schools courted him, he wanted what he called, “The big deal.”
As in, Division I.
No schools there were looking at him, either, but like a coach going for it on fourth down, he called his own play for WVU, as a walk-on who wasn’t officially recruited.
Besides, he was always a fan, even during the years when he lived in Pittsburgh as a kid.
It wasn’t long before his talents and work ethic caught official sideline eyes.
After two seasons, he started getting in games.
The mercenary safety just seemed to know where the football was going to be thrown.
Time in the weight room added to his size, along with a strong suggestion for a change to linebacker.
He pulled off a key sack of the quarterback in last week’s near-win against Oklahoma State.
Today, when the Mountaineers and Horned Frogs line up in Texas — kickoff is 4:15 p.m., for the nationally televised contest from Fort Worth — he’ll be running onto a football field for the last time as a Mountaineer.
Next fall, he’ll continue his graduate studies to become a civil engineer.
On the day after Thanksgiving, he said, he’ll definitely be counting his blessings.
Aside from a trip to a bowl game that isn’t going to happen now, he wouldn’t change a thing in the screenplay of a college career in twilight.
Including that decision to play for the enemy.
‘Somebody good-looking’
His mom’s family hails from Pittsburgh, the land of the Pitt Panthers, and the equally storied Backyard Brawl.
And, as said, the WVU football player and his parents called the place home for a time, before moving back to Morgantown.
Because of conference shifts, the Mountaineers and Panthers haven’t met on the football field in years.
The rivalry, though, can still wake the celluloid echoes in the memories of fans on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line.
Campbell’s grandfather, Gene Steratore Sr., in fact, was a football letterman for Pitt.
He was tough, raw-boned: A fearless running back who only, reluctantly, unlaced his cleats after a bad shoulder injury sidelined him in his senior year in 1953.
Poppy never got to see his grandson’s senior year at WVU. He died in June.
Steratore actually ended up cheering — Yinz are kiddin’, right? — for that other team down Interstate 79.
And, like Rudy, the patriarch had to go against forces, generationally ingrained, to do it.
Football and La Familia. Bless me, Father, for what I am about to do.
“He was pretty disgusted,” his grandson said, grinning.
“But he came around. We spent a lot of time together. I miss the guy.”
Just like a movie that makes you laugh and blink a tear at the same time.
Speaking of which: If Hollywood ever attempted a “Rudy”-type treatment of Campbell’s life, who would play him?
He laughed — and then answered the question with a question.
“Aw, jeez, man, I don’t know. Somebody good-looking?”
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