From The Trenches With Senior Defensive Back DeMarcus Faggins
Oct 22, 2001 | Football
Oct. 22, 2001
MANHATTAN, Kan. -
- by Erica Meadows, Kansas State Sports Information student assistant
Two Coach Bennetts. Two different football teams. Two specials sets of circumstances.
But with the help of both Coach Bennetts, senior cornerback DeMarcus Faggins came to Kansas State University and overcame adversity.
"Coach Bennett's brother was my head coach in high school," Faggins said. "So (Coach Phil Bennett) has kind of been around for a while. He's kind of been recruiting me ever since, for the whole time. He kind of ended up here and he recruited me to come here, so I came here."
Irving High School head coach, Jim Bennett, said he knew that Faggins would be a great player.
"Just watching him run, Phil and I both thought he would be a special player and could play at the Division I level," Jim Bennett said.
Faggins didn't grow up playing football, however. His first exposure to the game wasn't until he entered high school.
"The friends I had, they all played football. So that's when I first started ever playing football was my sophomore year," he said. "I was on JV and I was just playing. I wanted to play receiver, I didn't want to play cornerback. I wanted to just be a receiver."
Faggins began practicing at the cornerback position during the defensive portion of practices. He said most of the receivers went to defensive backs, so he thought that was where he should go, too.
That decision paid off. Coach Bennett asked Faggins to play cornerback for him on the varsity team the next year. He realized he needed to keep his grades up, but based on scores from his college entrance exams, he elected to attend Navarro (Texas) College, a two-year junior college, after graduating high school.
"I made that decision to keep going," he said. "I went to Navarro Junior College and started all over again."
Faggins was a two-year starter for the Bulldogs, and earned first team all-conference and honorable mention All-America honors as a sophomore.
After finishing his two years at Navarro, Faggins was faced with yet another decision, where to go from there. He was recruited by K-State, Colorado, Nebraska, KU, Middle Tennessee, Texas A&M and a lot of Division II schools. However, he based his decision to come to K-State on his relationship with Coach Phil Bennett.
"He developed a relationship with Phil at a young age," Jim Bennett said, "and I think that was crucial in his decision to go to Kansas State."
Faggins had moved to Irving, Texas, when he was 13- years-old after the death of his mother.
"I came from a single parent life," he said. "Then my mom, she passed away when I was 13, so I had to make a lot of decisions to get as far as I am.
"It's been hard. I had family, but it's not like your mom because she'd been there all my life. I really didn't get a chance to get to know her because I was young and I just wanted to go out and play. I really didn't sit down and have conversations with her."
His older sister, Kinyata Hatcher, filled the maternal role, and he said she has been the most influential person in his life.
"She's been like the mother to me," he said. "Even though she's two years older than me, she matured a lot faster than I did. She's been taking care of herself and kind of being a mother to me. She's been on my side no matter what, helping me through high school and just kind of kept my head up to succeed."
Hatcher said she felt the need to fill that empty role in his life.
"Considering that our mom passed away at such at an early age for both of us, I felt I needed to shelter him," she said. "I felt like I needed to be someone for him to look up to. There would be times where I would put myself on the back burner to make sure he was taken care of. That was my number one priority."
The death of his mother affected Faggins greatly and Hatcher said that he has made it a long way.
"Growing up, since we didn't have a mother, people, be it family or friends, didn't expect him to make it as far as he has," she said. "I could tell my mother's demise had really gotten to him. He's made it a long way."
She also said that it wasn't always easy to determine what emotions he experienced.
"It affected DeMarcus in several ways," she said. "Even at the funeral I can remember that he never really cried. He never showed any open emotions. It affected him silently. When he didn't know I was watching, I could tell how much it affected him."
Bennett described football as having an instrumental part in Faggins, personal growth while trying to sort out what he was feeling.
"His high school coaches and football gave him some structure," he said. "He saw it as a way to be successful because of his athletic ability. Before coming here, he didn't realize that he had any athletic ability. He saw a way he could get an education and make something of himself."
Making something of himself is one thing Faggins is striving to do, just to succeed.
"Since my mom isn't here to kind of guide me through, I just want to make her proud," he said. "Just to have my life together and not want for anything. I want to just make it in life. Nothing too hard."
Many people believe Faggins has already made his mother proud in several ways. His cousin, Dontaye Faggins, believes that she would be proud of her son for staying in school.
"When his mother first passed, it was hard," Dontaye said. "Now he's finished junior college, high school, now he's about to finish Division I and hopefully make it to the NFL."
Jim Bennett agreed that Faggins has exceeded in making others proud.
"I think he's done a great job for a young man who has come from where he has," Bennett said. "I can tell you this, he's made me proud of the things he's done. He's a great kid."
Although Faggins has learned to live life without his mother being physically present, he said her memory is never far from his thoughts.
"I can't get it out of my mind," he said. "She's always there. If I do this, would it be something she would agree with me on? I sometimes think twice about my decisions."
Those memories, however, get left behind once he steps onto the football field.
"When I make a decision it's like what my coach would think," Faggins said. "With football I just do what he thinks, most of the time, because he's coaching me to do that."
While Faggins keeps his mother's memory with him at all times, there is yet another possession that he cherishes.
"I own a picture," he said. "Not just one picture, but pictures of my mother. I own a picture hanging on my wall in my room.
"It's always there. It's the same one, the only one I've had since the funeral. I've been holding on to that ever since."
While most would see his mother's death as a negative experience, Faggins has seen it as an opportunity for personal growth.
"Anything could happen," he said. "Anything could happen bad, but you can still look at it as a positive. You can still make it in life because I think I've come a long way from where I started."
Faggins also doesn't want to use his experiences to conjure up sympathy.
"Don't feel bad for me," he said. "I've made it this far. I'm alright, I think."
Although Faggins has faced some difficult decisions throughout his life, he realizes the game is far from over.
"Out of all the decisions I've had to make, I think I've made the right decision so far to get this far," he said. "I'm still learning, growing up a little bit."
