Wake Forest Athletics
100% Cotten
8/22/2008 12:00:00 AM | Football
Aug. 22, 2008
Coach Jim Grobe and his staff usually try to keep the snap decisions to a minimum. But they'll have to make a huge one to start the season when they call on a Deacon, maybe even two, to fill the shoes of the graduated Nick Jarvis, who polished of a pretty much perfect longsnapping career at last season's Meineke Car Care Bowl. If Jarvis ever made a bad snap in four seasons, nobody can remember it. Jarvis has set a very high bar.
"He never messed up - ever," says sophomore Russell Nenon of Memphis, the odds on favorite to shortsnap on field goals and extra points. "That's hard to live up to."
Indeed. Following Jarvis might be like jumping in the pool with Michael Phelps or chasing after Jamaican blur Usain Bolt. Dead in the water or running for second place.
"Jarvis was always on point," adds Cary junior Greg Bechtel, at this point the leader of those who would succeed Jarvis longsnapping for punts. "But what we have to do now is concentrate on what we need to do and the task at hand rather than whose shoes we have to fill."
Bechtel had his chance last season when given an opportunity at Duke. On the Deacs' first punt of the game, Bechtel went out and assumed the position like he had so many times during his middle school and high school careers and the hundreds if not thousands of times during practice as a Demon Deacon.
That's when the trouble began.
"That wasn't fun," Bechtel smiles in retrospect.
He's able to smile because Wake Forest won the game, but due to operator error, actually two of them, the Deacs spotted the Devils two points - a safety that Bechtel watched between his legs and upside down.
"The first one was an OK snap, but we had a delay penalty," he recalls. "I wasn't used to looking at the play clock and snapping. So we had to redo the play. And the second one - I don't know - I guess I got a little antsy and it got away from me."
And away from punter Sam Swank who alertly sent the ball through the back of Wake's endzone for a safety. It could have been worse, but for Bechtel the trip back to the sideline was not a shining moment.
"Jogging back was definitely not fun," he reiterates. "I would have liked to have taken my jersey off and blended in with the grass."
Nenon seems to have the perfect approach.
"I'm going try to remain anonymous," he says. "Do my job, and get out."
Good plan. Had Bechtel executed the Duke snap, most folks - including yours truly - would have had no idea that he had even been in the game. Further scrutiny and questions after the fact are what revealed that it was not Jarvis who had made his first bad snap but Bechtel, his replacement. So much for anonymity.
Bechtel has been grafted back into the team's fabric after bolting before spring practice for Hollywood, a move that didn't make finding Jarvis' replacement any easier. Bechtel has an eye on a film career and was in position for an internship working on the upcoming movie surrounding the family of former Deacon linebacker Jon Abbate. But after several production delays and no work he headed back to Wake Forest.
"You have your whole life to do what you want to do with regard to your job," Bechtel explains. "You only have four years to be in college."
"And to leave the family and then try to work your way back in - you just never know whether or not you'll be accepted back. But I was accepted back with open arms, which was a real big plus for me."
And for the Demon Deacons if Bechtel can "...do what I've always done since middle school." If he can, this is one snap decision will likely be permanent.
