LINCOLN — Alfonzo Dennard was a typical freshman that first summer when he stepped onto the practice field at Nebraska and met his new secondary teammates.

Sure, the short, stocky kid seemed athletic. But his frame hadn't been trimmed, stuffed and chiseled by an offseason weight training program choreographed by professionals. Like the other first-year guys, he was naive and in a bit over his head. Probably a bit cocky, too.

Dennard needed to be put in his place. At least that's what Prince Amukamara thought.

It's June, so the coaches aren't around. There are no pads, no helmets, no footballs. Only willpower, technique and agility.

The coverage drill is simple. One player lines up as a receiver and jogs a fade route as a cornerback crowds him. A tennis ball is lobbed deep into the air downfield, and it's the defender's job to knock it down.

In other words, this is Amukamara's dojo. The eventual first-round NFL draft pick owns this drill.

He points at Dennard. "I want this freshman."

But Amukamara didn't know Dennard.

Amukamara didn't know that this "freshman" was a do-it-all legend back in Rochelle, Ga., who treated would-be tacklers like orange traffic cones. That the new guy could have been at Alabama, Clemson or North Carolina if those schools hadn't doubted his ability to make the grades. Amukamara didn't know that Dennard is fueled by the goal of someday paying back his single mother, who raised six boys in a two-bedroom trailer in a tiny rural town.

And he didn't know that being singled out and challenged is exactly the kind of scenario that Dennard thrives in.

Go ahead, assume he can't do it. Underestimate him. Doubt him. That's what Dennard wants.

"There were always people who said I wasn't going to make it," he said. "They were talking down on me. But that's motivation. That's going to make me work harder and try to prove myself."

Problem is, most of Dennard's secrets are out now.

He's a lockdown cornerback for the Huskers, rated highly by numerous NFL draft experts as he gets ready for his senior year. An Amukamara sidekick in 2010, Dennard will be the focal point of Nebraska's secondary this season, an early candidate for the Nagurski Trophy and the Bednarik and Thorpe Awards. Many preseason magazines have him tabbed as an All-American.

He used to hear the critics' voices over and over in his head, like overplayed pop hits that taunt the mind with endless replays.

Tune's changed. Dennard is getting barraged with compliments and praise, living a rock star life as a beloved Blackshirt in a football-crazed state. He's trying not to lose his edge, trying not to forget all the reasons he's in a near-perfect position to reach the goals he set as a young teenager.

"It's like a roller coaster, man," he said. "It goes good and sometimes it goes bad. You've got to be ready. You've got to overcome all that."

Small-town upbringing

"How do I get to Rochelle from here?"

Former Nebraska secondary coach Marvin Sanders had gotten lost on his first recruiting visit to see Dennard, so he asked that question to an attendant at the gas station somewhere off Interstate 75 in the plains of south-central Georgia.

The one thing Sanders remembers about the unlit rural area is this: "It gets dark. Really dark."

Sanders was in luck in that instance. The clerk by the cash register was from Rochelle.

Rochelle's not hard to find, really. But it's easy to miss.

There are two stoplights and a couple of convenience stores in the town of 1,400. It's surrounded by fields of cotton, peanuts, watermelon, cantaloupe.

A decent sit-down meal is at least 15 minutes away. The closest mall's almost an hour.

"I'm driving from Atlanta, and I'm thinking, 'Am I ever going to get there?'" Sanders remembers.

The typical small town, Rochelle doesn't attract many strangers. If you're not from there, you don't have much reason to visit. Everyone knows everyone. The kids are free to roam. It's not large enough for gangs and violence, but the youth don't have to search too hard to find trouble.

"Ain't too much to say about Rochelle," Dennard said, his Southern heritage evident in his voice. "Ain't much to do."

Dennard had seen many townsfolk grow up in Rochelle, go to high school, skip college, get a job and start raising their own kids.

Dennard decided early on he wouldn't be part of that cycle. As a middle-schooler, he thought often about a future away from the small town. His twin brother, Lorenzo, and next door neighbor Deauntay Legrier dreamed, too.

Sports, they figured, were the ticket.

Alfonzo, Lorenzo and Legrier were the neighborhood ringleaders, always organizing some type of athletic pastime.

Rochelle had an indoor basketball court, but it was adults only. So the kids cut out the spokes of a bicycle rim and nailed the rim to a tree. They played so often that the grass died off and left only packed dirt, terrain that substituted nicely for a hardwood court.

Tackle football was supposed to be off limits. Mom's orders. But every now and then, when Mom wasn't looking or wasn't around, the kids would get in a stance and drive one another to the ground — just like the Hurricane boys at "The U" — Alfonzo was a huge Miami fan.

"That was what we did," Lorenzo said. "We always stayed around each other, pushing each other. We were trying to do something better, trying to make it better for us, make it easier for our mom."

Their dad wasn't in the picture. Never was.

Andrew Benjamin knew that. He had the same father, different mother. But he looked after half-brothers Alfonzo and Lorenzo like his own children. Made them do push-ups every night before bed. Taught them to realize that algebra was just as important as the playbook. Reminded them of their goals and urged them not to quit.

Benjamin could have, and should have, gone to college. He was a star linebacker at Wilcox County High School. Graduated in 1991. Dreamed of Orange Bowls.

"I told them to be better than me, to do more than me," said Benjamin, now 39. "I told them, 'Listen to me: You're going to be OK. I know what it feels like to be successful and what it feels like to be not successful.'"

Benjamin eventually persuaded Alfonzo's mom, Rose Mary, to allow her kids to play football. Alfonzo put on pads for the first time in ninth grade.

Turnaround story

Mark Ledford, Wilcox's football coach, already knew about him. Doubling as a P.E. teacher, he'd seen the agile teenager running circles around his peers in a middle school gymnasium.

By his freshman year of high school, Dennard was doing much the same on a football field.

The Patriots were facing regional powerhouse Twiggs County. Ledford remembers that the game plan was to milk the clock on offense, be stingy and nasty on defense and maybe have a chance at the end. But Twiggs County ran a play action and scored on its first play.

Dennard took the stage next.

"We called a go route and Alfonzo catches it and zig-zigs about 75 yards for a touchdown," Ledford said. "That was his first touchdown. He caught it and broke about four tackles against the best team we were going to play."

The Patriots lost that game to Twiggs County and finished 2-8. But they had a winning record the next season. And Dennard did some of everything. He played outside linebacker, cornerback, receiver, running back. He returned kickoffs and punts, even booted the punts one year. During his senior year, Wilcox went 13-2 and earned a Class A runner-up finish, reaching the state title game for the first time in school history.

When Dennard and his classmates were freshmen, barely 100 fans showed up at Patriot games. This fall, Benjamin guesses there will be more than 3,500 packed tightly in the bleachers for games.

"They used to cry so hard (as freshmen) when they got beat every Friday night," Benjamin said. "But I told them every day, 'Hard work and dedication.' They turned the community around."

Three years after donning pads for the first time, Dennard got his first scholarship offer from Clemson. He eventually committed to North Carolina, which is how Sanders heard about him.

Sanders, an assistant at UNC from 2004 to 2006, had joined Bo Pelini's coaching staff in late 2007. And both defensive gurus were eager to stockpile a depleted secondary with as much potential as possible in their first year with NU.

UNC had reportedly backed off Dennard before signing day in February 2008. Time for Sanders to make his pitch.

Dennard signed with Nebraska without ever visiting Lincoln. Sanders wanted him to come up one particular weekend, but Dennard had state basketball. Instead, Dennard just looked at photos on the computer.

"I took a chance," Dennard said.

He regretted it soon after.

Homesick

Benjamin's phone rang one day in the fall of 2008, Dennard's first year at Nebraska. Benjamin smiled, but then he heard his little brother say the words.

Dennard wanted to come home.

Twin Lorenzo had signed with Hutchinson (Kan.) Community College but was ready to transfer. Legrier was redshirting as a linebacker at Western Michigan.

Alfonzo was contributing some on special teams for the Huskers, but he was having trouble mastering Pelini's defensive concepts. The coaches were riding him hard. He missed his buddies. Friends and family members from Rochelle were telling him they'd welcome him back.

Benjamin listened on the phone, waited until Dennard was done talking. Then he raised his voice.

"Homesick? Boy, what you homesick for? We've got nothing here. You stay out there and take it. Weather the storm. Try to make something for yourself."

Dennard hung up. Benjamin was right. Tough love.

Gradually Dennard got the hang of things. By the fifth game of his sophomore season, he was in the starting lineup. By his junior year, he was a second-team All-American.

And people across the nation were seeing the talent he'd shown Amukamara in his first summer in Lincoln.

Staying hungry

The two lined up, Dennard as the receiver, Amukamara as the corner. A teammate recited a cadence and the two players took off. It's not a full sprint, though. Speed is not the point of the drill. The purpose is to battle for the tennis ball, a battle Amukakara figured was inevitably another knockdown for him.

Then Dennard launched into the air.

"He skyrocketed over me and grabbed the ball," Amukamara said. "And he gave me this look. Like, don't ever call me out again."

Amukamara learned the hard way.

Dennard doesn't introduce himself by saying:

"Hello, I'm Alfonzo. I'm 5-foot-10, and the first time I grabbed a rim and emphatically dunked a basketball through it was in ninth grade. From then on, I had more jaw-dropping, in-game highlights than Vince Carter in a dunk contest."

But he could.

Sanders said he once saw Dennard throw the ball off the backboard and jam it — during a game.

Dennard doesn't tell people about the time he had to step in at punter for Wilcox, when he rolled out rugby-style, tucked the ball underneath his arm and juked his way to a first down, all against coach's orders. Did that twice against rival Hawkinsville. Charles Johnson, now a defensive end with the Carolina Panthers, was on that team.

Dennard won't openly say what academic hurdles he had to clear, either. That he was a B and C student until his junior year, when he buckled down and started earning As and Bs. It took him three tries to pass the social studies and science portions of Georgia high school graduation test. And he made such a dramatic improvement on his ACT that he got red-flagged even after enrolling at Nebraska and had to take the exam again. He got the same score.

"I like proving people wrong," he said. "That's one thing about me. That's how I live."

Or used to live, anyway.

There aren't a lot of doubters around Dennard anymore, which is strangely a bit worrisome to those who know him best.

For a kid who went to sleep every night in a trailer home and in a room with two sets of bunk beds, a dormitory room at Nebraska seems luxurious.

In the winter, Dennard's main complaint about the Lincoln weather is that the muddy snow leaves residue on his brand new shoes. He didn't have those worries in Rochelle.

Living in Lincoln is comfortable, Dennard says, because "everybody's nice to each other. I love the people around here, the atmosphere, everywhere. That's how it was in Rochelle."

Life is good, and human nature would suggest that Dennard could become complacent, lose his edge.

He's trying his best not to. Lorenzo, planning to join the football team at Missouri Valley College in Marshall, Mo., later this month, stops by Alfonzo's place from time to time, just to remind his brother of the goal. He was at Fan Day Friday.

Other family members — maybe as many as 15 — are hoping to be at Nebraska's Big Ten home opener against Ohio State on Oct. 8. If not, like every other Saturday, they'll crowd into Mom's house to watch Alfonzo on TV. They hope to be doing that for a long time into the future.

Benjamin weighs in most days on the phone.

"I don't want him to ever forget where he comes from," Benjamin said. "I try to teach him to stay humble. Don't get happy. Don't quit working."

Defensive backs coach Corey Raymond, hired to replace Sanders in February, couldn't have joined the NU staff at a better time, it seems.

He's an ex-NFLer who believes the best cornerbacks succeed with proper technique, not overpowering physicality.

That's new to Dennard, a 205-pound muscular pest who's used to intimidating receivers with merciless contact the moment the football's snapped. He's a bully on the field. It was pretty common last year for Austin Cassidy to be regrouping with his teammates in the defensive huddle, wondering where Dennard went.

"He comes running from five yards off the sideline because he just took his guy out of bounds and never let him back in," Cassidy said. "He just beats people up."

Not anymore. Raymond says corners can't get away with that style in the Big Ten — or in the NFL, for that matter.

Dennard has a new challenge now. Maybe a few skeptics.

He'll be going up against a league full of new faces, guys who don't know him. Guys who might assume ...

Dennard won't introduce himself. He'll let them figure out his story on their own.

Contact the writer:

402-473-9585, jon.nyatawa@owh.com

twitter.com/JonNyatawa

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