“Play…and win for the team”

ontarioprospectchallenge.com

Position: LG/RG/DT
Height/Weight: 6’2, 290 Ibs
Team: A. B. Lucas Vikings
Commitment: N/A
Official Visits: Wilfrid Laurier
Consideration: Wilfrid Laurier, Western, McMaster, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), Case Western Reserve

The beauty of sport often rests in the ways it brings out the best in people.

Participating and thriving in sport demands physical prowess, mental toughness, intelligence, hard work, persistence and perhaps most of all the ability to work with others.

Even in individual sports, built on the decisions and strength of a single athlete, there are coaches, trainers and role models along the way that require each athlete works with others to be better. In team sports this is magnified. In a sport like football, it’s a necessity.

With teams exceeding two dozen players and a plethora of coaches and staff, football is the ultimate team sport.

For A. B. Lucas Secondary School’s Eddie Nam, succeeding is about the team, not the individual.

While Nam is spending his summer in the gym and at camps working on technique and strength, he’s insistent that his focus is on bringing his team to the OFSAA Championship in the fall, the height of football glory in Ontario, irrespective of individual success.

“For my upcoming season, my goal is to be a team player,” he said, not mincing his words. “Play for the team and win for the team.”

This team mentality is something he took away from the Ontario Prospect Challenge (OPC), where he says each player had to work together with people they’d never met to come together and build a team “in two practices.” It was, of course, the team-building experience that was Nam’s favourite part of the OPC.

Next year, Nam hopes to return to the OPC and build on the experience he had this time around in hopes of taking on a more prominent role.

“I am looking forward to meeting new faces and my goal is to be the team leader,” he said, a sense of selflessness becoming more and more apparent with each answer.

As an individual, Nam admits he still needs to work on a lot of different techniques and skills, recognizing that “football never stops.”

For the budding young athlete however, there’s more than just football that never stops, there’s a kindred spirit and enthusiasm for working with others that makes the best in the sport unstoppable.

Nam’s on his way.