Youth serves Looney well

By age 17, Felix Mendelssohn had written 12 symphonies, Pele was a national hero of Brazil, George Harrison was lead guitarist for the Beatles and Joe Looney was playing left guard for Wake Forest.

"Seventeen years old," Looney said. "We played Baylor Aug. 28 and I was 17 when I stepped onto the field.

"I didn't start that game, but I played a couple of snaps."

Big for his age, or any age for that matter, Looney started seven games that freshman season of 2008 and 11 last season. So even though he remains more than three weeks shy of his 20th birthday (Aug. 31), Looney ranks fourth on the team with 18 starts.

With center Russell Nenon sidelined while recovering from shoulder surgery, Looney was the clear-cut leader of the offensive line during spring drills. He and Nenon will be the only offensive linemen with more than nominal experience when the Deacons open this season against Presbyterian on Sept. 2.

The prodigy is growing up, just in time to help anchor an offensive line that, with the question mark at quarterback left by the graduation of Riley Skinner, appears to hold the key to the Deacons' success.

Coach Jim Grobe said one reason Looney was able to crack the lineup at such a tender age was his enthusiasm, which Grobe compared to that of Aaron Curry, the All-America linebacker picked by the Seattle Seahawks as the fourth player chosen in the 2009 NFL Draft.

"He's Aaron Curry at offensive guard," Grobe said. "That's what Joe Looney is -- as far as his attitude. Now whether he ends up playing that good, I can't tell you. But he's a guy that bounces to practice, likes to practice, loves to play on Saturday and kind of lives to play football.

"And he's liked by everybody on the football team. He's one of the favorite guys, just because he's such a good person."

Looney, at 6-3, weighed in for last night's first practice of the season at around 315 pounds, or 20 more than he weighed when he arrived at Wake Forest in January of 2008. And though he defers leadership to senior Nenon, whom he calls "The Big Dog," Looney is more comfortable showing the less-experienced linemen the tricks he has learned over two seasons in the trenches.

"Anytime a freshman needs help with something they're going to come to the guys who have been playing," Looney said. "I help them out the best I can, tell them the things I did to get to the position I'm at.

"If I can't tell them the right answer, I know Nenon can."

Advising the new guys is the least Looney can do, given the help he received from players such as Chris DeGeare and Jeff Griffin when he was thrown into the deep end of the college competition as a first-year freshman.

The opportunity to go through a spring of practices his first semester at Wake Forest helped Looney survive the experience. But Looney made the accomplishment of playing offensive line as a first-year freshman look easier than it actually was.

"It was rough, especially coming from high school where you're all-state and you're the big man on campus," Looney said. "And then you come to college and go against guys like Boo Robinson and John Russell. You're just like ‘Oh man, I've got to step my game up.'

"It just really motivated me -- ‘This is what I'm going against' -- to get in the weight room to get stronger and get faster."

Grobe has said that what pages of the playbook he plans to incorporate into this year's game plans will depend on which of the four candidates -- junior Skylar Jones, sophomore Ted Stachitas, redshirt freshman Brendan Cross and freshman Tanner Price -- emerges as the starting quarterback. But he has made no secret of the desire to return to the days before Skinner arrived when the Deacons were a dominant running team.

Those plans are music to Looney's ears. The Deacons ranked eighth in the ACC last year with 131.8 rushing yards a game and Josh Adams led the team with 541 yards -- hardly numbers to make an offensive lineman pound his chest with pride.

"I'm very fired up about it," Looney said. "As an offensive lineman, you don't get a lot of shine. But when a running back gains big yards you feel good about that at the end of the game. When you gain 250 rushing yards on a team, as an offensive line corps you feel really good about that.

"If you're running the football, it really shows that you can control the game. If you're a good offensive line, you can control the game. It's a lot of fun running the football, and especially proving to the coaches that you can do it, that your five guys up there can open a hole and make things happen for a running back."

dcollins@wsjournal.com.


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