there' nothing like coming all the way across the field and making a nice tackle." Merrigan's most important tackle came in the team' most important game. With barely a minute left in the traditional finale, he eemed to come from nowhere to over haul a Bowdoin player who had scooped up a teammate's fumble and was racing for the goal line and a potentially tying touch down. After the game, Merrigan talked of all of the running and strength conditioning that had equipped him to make such a play. "l11ere' a mall ski lope in my town "'·hich I ran up and down every day thi summer," he aid. "I would come home and my father would tease me, 'What are you killing yourelf for? This is only Oivi ion Ill football. obody cares.' "When the Bowdoin game ended, my father came up to me and said, 'Everything you did during the ummer ju t got paid back right there.' l11a t moment meant so much to me."
two blockers and blind ided the quarter back, who fumbled. It turned what might have been We leyan's winning drive into Colby's clinching touchdown. "That mo ment personally fulfilled everything," said Jenkin . "All tho e people who gave me a hard time for working so hard ! crew them. For a few moments, that wa per anal glory that paid off."
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ne of the team's mo t dynamic forces over the last three years ha been co captain and linebacker Greg Suffredini, who was an unlinebackerlike 1 0 pound when he came to Colby from Lexington, Mass., and tand only 5'9 with a few pairs of wool socks on. "I was pretty much a walk-on," uffredini said. "I mean, I had contact with Coach, but
I \\·a -n't really recruited. I didn't e\·en have a sentence in the recruit book they put together." Ho\\'e,·er, uffredini' hard work ha resulted in more than enough attention ince. In 1 990, -uddenly shoved into a starting role after the fraternity incident, Suffredini made m·er 1 00 tackles. "I t's a little ,,·eird being a linebacker this -i:e," he said. "You can dart around, but -ometi1T1e- when the offensi,·e line -rands up, you can'tsee \\'hathappens. " He'd added 2.5 pounds of mu -cle by his junior year and al-o developed a high le,·el of field san-y· playing in tandem with Eric OeCosta, the other captain and linebacker. They were known a the Smwf -little men in blue. "One of the thing- th.at d i · ranees the Smurfs is that the e are kid wh.o\·e taken the time to get familiar \\"ith the opponent' offense to the point where they practically know it better than the opponent doe ," Au tin aid.
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f anything rivaled Merrigan's work ethic, it had to be the conditioning regimen of Shawn Jenkins, a ix-foot, 205-pound de fen ive tackle who grew tried of hearing he was too mall for the po ition. "For my four year here my ize ha been the butt end of every joke," he said after the ea on. "I've alway wanted to talk about this. Lunch, d inner, practice, every ingle joke." Jenkin ' retribution came on the field. "I like to play knowing I'm in the be t hape po ible, even though I don't have the greate t size," he aid. "But I've never been put on my back, and I've gone up again t guy who are 265, 2 7 5 pound ." Au tin ay there's no ecret to why his under ized tackle urvived in a world of giants. "Thar kid couldn't get past 205 if he tried, but he'll be working out until the day he die ," the coach aid. "He ha worked extremely hard to build his trength, and now he can bench a much as most any lineman 50 pound heavier than h im." Like Merrigan, who i hi housemate and frequent training companion, Jenkirt ca hed in his hard work on a aving play. Late in the We leyan game, he broke pa t
Todd Bosselait, a receiver iwith no fingers on one hand, scores a touchdown . 29
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