THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 6, 1996 TAG: 9609060689
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY STEVE CARLSON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 157 lines
It was Cornell Brown's first organized football game, one of those pee-wee versions where the kids seem to be drowning in their jerseys and pads, and the helmets are so big in proportion to their bodies that they look like a bunch of miniature Martians.
Cornell Brown looked other-worldly to the kids and their petrified parents.
``He walked out on the field, and he looked like he was ready for college right then,'' says Reuben Brown, Cornell's big brother. ``His shirt was cut off and his pads were tight; he was a thick kid. All of a sudden I hear all the parents screaming, `That kid is too old to be playing.'
``I could see right then that this was his game.''
Virginia Tech, 15th-ranked and opening its season Saturday night at Akron, has Reuben to thank that college football is still Cornell's game.
After the Hokies' Dec. 31 Sugar Bowl win, Cornell visited Reuben in Buffalo, where the older brother works as a second-year starting offensive guard for the Bills. Cornell, a consensus All-American defensive end his junior year, had decided to bolt for the NFL's big bucks, telling his brother and a friend: ``I'm gone.''
``It's hard to turn down something you've always wanted to do when the opportunity is in your face,'' Cornell says.
Reuben, who faced a similar decision following his junior year at Pittsburgh and returned for another year, gently dissuaded Cornell.
There's no rush, Reuben urged. Play one more year of college, improve and you will be better prepared for the NFL.
Cornell took heed.
``I'm nervous for him because there's a lot of things that can happen from now until the end of the season,'' Reuben says. ``But he's a bad cat, I'm telling you right now. You're watching the best defensive player in the game when you watch him play this year.''
Virginia Tech bills Brown - third nationally last year in sacks (14) and total tackles for loss (25) - as its best player since 1984 Outland Trophy winner Bruce Smith, who came to Tech from Norfolk's Booker T. Washington High. That's the kind of prize Brown has his eyes on - an Outland (best interior lineman), Lombardi (best lineman) or Bronko Nagurski (best defensive player) award.
The specter of Smith's accomplishments is inescapable for Brown. A stairwell in Tech's Jamerson Athletic Center is adorned with a picture of a smiling Smith, arms folded, wearing his Buffalo Bills uniform with an American flag flowing in the background. A plaque identifies him as the Outland winner.
In three years, Brown has 28 sacks. Smith had 46.
``He's going for Bruce Smith's record,'' says Tony Morrison, Brown's roommate.
But he will be going at things a bit differently than in past years. Virginia Tech coaches have promised to move Brown - exclusively an end his first three years at Tech - around in the defense this year. He might come from one side on one play, the other side on the next and up the gut on a third.
The idea, Tech coach Frank Beamer says, is to create stress for opposing offenses.
``I think it's important that the offense has to identify where he is after they come to the line of scrimmage, and if they want to change their blocking scheme they have to do it at the line of scrimmage,'' Beamer says.
To Brown, this constitutes progress.
After his freshman season, he asked the coaches if he could move to linebacker. Stay a bit longer at end, they said.
After his sophomore season, he requested a move to linebacker. You're too productive at end, Brown was told.
After his junior season, he tried one last time. We'll move you around and do some different things to free you up, Brown was told.
Being stuck at end has frustrated Cornell.
``Kinda, sorta, but I just enjoy playing,'' Brown says. ``This is how it's worked out, and I accept it. As long as I'm able to do the things I can do, people notice me.''
It's irritated Reuben.
``They should play him at linebacker if they're smart,'' Reuben says. ``If you play him at linebacker, you can't double-team him. It will be an unfortunate thing for him and the team if they don't move him around to different positions and showcase his skills.''
Reuben says Cornell cannot play defensive end in the NFL. At 6-foot-2, 246 pounds, he's Lilliputian compared to most NFL defensive ends, at least a couple of inches too short and about 30 pounds too light to take on 6-6, 300-pound NFL tackles.
``All the speed in the world is not going to get him around that guy,'' Reuben says.
Although Cornell has not been able to prove it in college, Reuben says his little brother can drop back in coverage, stop the run and rush off the edge as a linebacker in an NFL scheme.
Wherever he plays, Brown ratchets the intensity all the way up. Teammates have described him as crazed during games, yelling and screaming at opponents, teammates and officials while working himself into a frenzied quest for quarterbacks.
``He's our emotional leader,'' linebacker Brandon Semones says. ``When he's playing well is when he's real excited, and how he does sets the tempo for the other guys.''
Reuben says it has always been this way with Cornell, 21 and three years younger than his brother. Cornell was forever the youngest guy in the sandlot football games, trying to keep up with Reuben and his friends. Cornell had the bruises, scars and stitches to prove it.
There were other scars that could not be seen. The Browns' parents separated when Cornell was in the seventh grade. Eventually Reuben, Cornell and their two sisters moved with their mother to Lynchburg, about 45 minutes from their father's home in rural Amherst County.
Their father drove in almost daily to send the kids off to school, but still, ``in any situation where the parents aren't together, it's tough,'' Reuben says. ``We had each other. We found comfort in one another.''
That bond remains today. Reuben and Cornell regard each other as best friends.
Cornell went to Buffalo this summer to help Reuben move into his new house, and stayed for about six weeks. They worked out, hung out, went to clubs and played countless hours of video games.
Reuben says he brags about Cornell so much that all the Bills know him and treat him like their own little brother. Cornell tools around Blacksburg in a Ford Explorer, a gift from Reuben. They talk on the phone at least once a week.
``He's not much of a talker,'' Reuben says. ``I have to drag words out of him and make him talk to me.
``Very few people can say they're close friends of Cornell because he really keeps to himself a lot. He doesn't like being around large groups and socializing. He only feels comfortable around family and friends, and even then he's still a quiet guy.''
Brown caught some flak for giving the media the silent treatment at the Sugar Bowl. Then he skipped a chance to chat with Big East and national press at the conference's media day in August, not recommended for someone seeking national recognition and awards.
Brown acknowledged this week that the media dodging stemmed from a civil suit by a woman who claimed Brown witnessed a rape by two of Brown's roommates. He didn't want to field questions about it. Brown's name was later dropped from the suit when the woman's lawyer said she learned Brown could not have been present at the time of the alleged rape.
``I really didn't want to get into that,'' Brown says. ``I didn't know where I stood and all the facts about it.''
The fact about Brown's college career is that Virginia Tech has enjoyed unparalleled success the last three seasons compared with any other period in its 102 years of college football. The Hokies were 2-8-1 the season before Brown arrived, and are 27-9 since.
The former Virginia Group AAA defensive player of the year out of Lynchburg's E.C. Glass High School is regarded as the cornerstone in the rebuilding process, perhaps the most important factor in Tech's turnaround. His line coach last year estimated Brown played 98 percent of the defensive snaps in three seasons.
And he will be the cornerstone of the defense again this season. Brown was credited with 103 tackles last year, the most by a Tech defensive end since 1977, when statisticians started recording tackle stats. That's more than Smith ever had.
The going could be tougher this year. Brown was part of an experienced, senior-laden line last year. His cohorts this year lack the same talent, strength and maturity, so Brown will face a myriad of double- and triple-teams. He will have to be better to be as productive.
Brown simply wants to stand out in the crowd, as he did so many years ago on that pee-wee field.
``I want to be the best player in college this year defensively,'' Brown says. ``That's my goal, to be an all-the-time, big-time player - somebody you take notice of, no matter what, who at any point of the game is able to take over the game and control it.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
ALAN KIM/Landmark News Service
Virginia Tech's Cornell Brown shows off his new-found media savvy
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