The players wake up at 5:30 a.m. for an intense workout, then attend six classes, only to go home every night and spend at least four hours studying.

Then there’s the load of playing Division I football. For the members of the Army, Air Force and Navy football teams, this is a daily reality.

And the head coaches of the three academy football teams face the challenge of squeezing the ingredients for a successful football team around their athletes’ busy schedules, high academic standards and military requirements.

‘They wear down,’ Navy head coach Paul Johnson said. ‘I was asking some players yesterday about energy levels. They get real tired. It’s getting toward the end of the semester. They have classes and they’ve been playing football all fall. We don’t practice longer than an hour and a half each day because anything longer would be counter-productive.’

And it’s the same at all the military academies. While other schools place a heavy emphasis on athletic success, it is viewed as only a small part of life at the academies.

All the service academies operate under a strict daily itinerary that dictates where cadets need to be at certain times. Under that schedule, coaches only have a few hours to work with the team. At most schools, coaches can hold players after practice to improve on a weak area. Even if something goes wrong during practice, coaches at the military academies have no liberty to extend their time with the team.

‘We operate here under the master schedule,’ Air Force head coach Fisher DeBerry said. ‘If we don’t like the way practice is going, we can’t call up the dining hall and tell them we’re going to be late. They have to be in academic quarters at night. It’s not possible to meet with the team then. They have to be in their squadron studying.

‘We don’t see our kids during the day before practice. Our kids go to class all day. It’s quite unique. It’s tough for a coach coming out of a state university to adapt to the schedule here.’

But the schedule is not the only thing to which coaches need to adapt. Recruiting also is particularly difficult. The difficult schedule, strict academic standard and military service obligation turn off many potential recruits.

‘Sometimes kids think it’s a tougher road,’ Citadel head coach John Zernhelt said. ‘It’s a little more difficult and kids wear down as the year goes on. It’s a structured day. You can tell the parents he’s going to eat, go to class, do homework and not be out past midnight.’

While the average college student would never want to be subjected to that kind of schedule, athletes at military academies see it as preparation for a successful life. The military offers a guaranteed job while other athletes still may be looking for work after graduation.

‘There’s so many positives about it,’ Johnson said. ‘It’s a great education. These players know what an academy degree can do. You are setting yourself up for life. You don’t have to be a career military person. There’s a huge network and some companies look specifically for academy athletes because they can balance all the requirements on them.’

And coaches use the certainty of a future in the military while recruiting. The military academies believe they are the best choice for athletes that want to learn how to succeed under intense pressure.

Many athletes jump at the chance to play collegiate athletics and serve in the military.

‘One of the things they learn here is to prioritize,’ DeBerry said. ‘This is a type of education that our players want to pursue. They see the dividends down the road. It’s a guaranteed job. We all know what the job market’s like now. The military can offer a great career.’

When ABC executives picked up the Utah-Wyoming game on Nov. 13, they planned on actually showing the game.

A power outage at Wyoming’s War Memorial Stadium delayed the start of the game one hour, 40 minutes. With the delay, ABC’s Salt Lake City affiliate, KTVX, aired the movie ‘Harry Potter’ to fill empty space.

When the game started, the station was unable to pick up the game because of a contractual clause that made it necessary for KTVX to air ‘Harry Potter’ in its entirety. KTVX picked up the game in the second half.

Utah won 45-28 and remained undefeated.

Pat Tillman, the former Arizona Cardinals and Arizona State football player, gave up millions of dollars to serve his country as an Army Ranger.

On Saturday, ASU honored Tillman’s efforts in Afghanistan by retiring his jersey at halftime of the ASU-Washington State game. He was killed in battle last spring.

Friends, family and former teammates gathered at Sun Devil Stadium for the halftime ceremony.

Published on November 17, 2004 at 12:00 pm