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Friday, October 10, 1997

Aggies' Dat Nguyen learned value of hustle

By BRENT ZWERNEMAN / Bryan-College Station Eagle

COLLEGE STATION, Texas -- Dat Nguyen's silver platter is 100 yards long and smells of sweet green. His parents, Ho and Tammy Nguyen, showed him its fruits were within his hustle.

"My parents had to work all of the time to put food on the table," says Nguyen, Texas A&M's star linebacker. "Mom worked two jobs, and dad had to go to work all day, and I would see him maybe at night before I went to sleep.

"It just goes to show you that what you want is not always going to be on a silver platter. You've always got to work for it regardless of where it is and what it is and how long it will take.

"But eventually you will be successful if you have your mind set on what you really want to do."

Nguyen leads the Aggies with 34 tackles, and he's led the team the past two seasons in that category. Last year he was second in the Big 12 with 147 tackles, and the honors and recognition during his junior season are gathering steam.

But he says none of it matters.

"I don't think about stuff like that," Nguyen says. "I don't want to be isolated from my teammates."

That's understandable considering Nguyen is the only player of Vietnamese descent to don football pads for A&M, and it's a distinction he doesn't wear lightly.

"I think it's neat," he says. "It made me stand out from the team at first, but it doesn't bother me now. The guys accepted me in as part of the team, and I'm just a part of the team.

"At first I kind of felt awkward because my background was a little different, and I didn't know what they would think of me."

It's an odd idea that Nguyen, who's the heart of A&M's Wrecking Crew defense and the embodiment of its hustle, once thought he may not fit in at Texas A&M.

Now he calls himself "a regular student and a little bigger than average Oriental person."

Bespectacled in gold rims -- "I'm blind as a bat without them," Nguyen says -- and nondescript clothing, Nguyen hardly looks the role of warrior when he's wandering the dining hall or the campus sidewalks.

But he's never fooled his coach.

"Dat Nguyen is a coach's delight," R.C. Slocum says. "He's very tough, and he has what all great players have: great instincts.

"He reminds me of Ed Simonini more than any player we've had. He doesn't look like a player, but you watch those tapes, and he makes plays."

Simonini, who played in the NFL for the Baltimore Colts and New Orleans Saints, starred as an undersized linebacker at A&M. Nguyen is 6 feet 1 inches and 213 pounds.

Last year teammates voted Nguyen Defensive MVP and his 10.4 tackles per game over two years is short of only Johnny Holland's school record 10.6. Holland starred for the Green Bay Packers, which should be a good omen for Nguyen.

But he only has his eyes set as far as A&M's next game. He's seen too many guys playing for the pros while still in college.

"I don't want to think about that," Nguyen says of the possibility of professional football. "You can get distracted. You can tell a lot of guys get cautious of getting hurt or something to mess up their draft pick or whatever. But you can't worry about that.

"If you get hurt, I guess football wasn't meant for your future."

Nguyen red-shirted his first year out of Rockport's Fulton High, so he's classified as a senior academically. Nguyen is scheduled to graduate with an agricultural economics degree this spring, and then he plans to enter graduate school during his senior year of football at A&M.

He's a guy who appreciates a good -- and inexpensive -- education.

"They're paying for my school," Nguyen says with a smile. "So I may as well get it through. Sometimes people don't see the big picture. For me, it's like, What am I going to be doing 10 years from now?"

Tammy was pregnant with Dat when the family fled Vietnam as the Viet Cong invaded the South. The family entered Thailand and then made its way to America, where Dat was born in Fort Smith, Ark., after a church group offered shelter. The Nguyens then spent time in Kalamazoo, Mich., with another church group before the cold drove them to Rockport.

Nguyen's parents shrimped for a time around Port Aransas and now run Hu-Dat's Restaurant in Rockport.

When the family came to America, football to the Nguyens meant soccer in the States.

"The biggest sport overseas was soccer," Nguyen says. "You know, quick little guys kicking the ball. But Asian kids are now adapted more to the American culture where we're a lot bigger and have more ability."

His parents have attended a handful of games and have a new conversation topic with friends and the restaurant's patrons. His mother knew nothing about football in the beginning.

"Now she knows everything about it," Nguyen says. "It's just amazing how my parents have adapted to it. Now they have another subject to talk about."

Nguyen's love for the game -- he says football kept him out of trouble with the law starting in junior high -- should inspire kids chasing dreams.

"You will always question yourself," Nguyen says. "Do I have the potential to play, or am I good enough to play? But what you do is go out there and give it all you can.

"I'm not real big, tall or fast. But there's always a way around that. If you give it all you can, good things will come."

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Distributed by The Associated Press