From Bed, Bath and Beyond to blitzes: Beal’s path to Sooners was unconventional
COLUMBUS, OHIO — The days grated on Emmanuel Beal.
He’d squeeze in some sleep in the afternoons and evenings before heading to work at a Columbus-area gas station.
He worked third shift, manning the counter overnight and serving a trickle of people coming in for gas, a jolt of caffeine or a six pack.
Beal would get off work and head to job No. 2 — packing boxes at a Bed, Bath and Beyond warehouse full of bedding and lotions and towels and whatever else they asked from 5 a.m. to 2 p.m., when he’d get off work and start the process all over again with a few precious hours of sleep.
How, Beal wondered, did he get here?
Just a year earlier, when Beal was in high school, Michigan State was recruiting him before backing off due to his grades.
Now, the former Reynoldsburg star wasn’t playing football. He wasn’t even working out. He had no prospects of ever stepping foot on a football field as a player again, though he held out hope that it would happen.
Then came the gun to Beal’s face.
Working the late-night shift comes with its own set of problems, and the prospect of being robbed was the worst.
It wasn’t the first time Beal’s gas station had been robbed when he was on duty, but when it happened again, Beal was shaken.
Not only did it scare Beal — he wondered how many times this might happen and would it ever end badly for him — but it spurred him into action.
“I can’t do this,” Beal remembers thinking. “I’ve got to do something else.”
Four years later, not only is Beal playing football, but he’s Oklahoma’s leading returning tackler from last year’s team. He is one of the anchors at linebacker as the No. 5-ranked Sooners head back to the area where Beal’s football journey revived four years ago when OU faces No. 2 Ohio State on Saturday.
After Beal’s experience at the gas station, he started researching junior college football programs.
The closest, he found out, was more than seven hours away in Scranton, Pa.Less than two weeks later, he was on campus.
“Emmanuel was on a mission,” Reynoldsburg High coach Buddy White said. “He
knew what he wanted to do — he wanted to play Division I football.
“He knew that he had dug a hole his freshman and sophomore years in high school. But that’s one thing that I really am most proud of — he had a plan, he stuck with his plan, and he made it work.”
At Lackawanna, he found a chance, but not much else initially. He walked on with the Falcons.
“They had no idea who I was,” Beal said. “I was like 195 (pounds) playing D-end. It was like, ‘Who is this guy?’”
The Lackawanna coaches had little idea about Beal the football player, though they’d made some calls on him when he showed up.
“When you’re a walkon, they didn’t really watch much film,” Beal said. “I showed up. ‘We gonna take his money’ That’s how it was. It paid off.”
Beal started off at defensive end, where he’d played in high school, but soon after his arrival he moved to linebacker and blossomed.
He was close to going to New Mexico, before Sooners linebackers coach Tim Kish spotted Beal while recruiting another Lackawanna linebacker — Kapri Doucet.
Then last season, Beal was forced into the lineup as a starter after Tay Evans’ career-ending injury and thrived, with 81 tackles and 10 starts.
“That kid really works hard,” defensive coordinator Mike Stoops said. “It matters to him.
“It’s not always perfect, but he works hard to make it perfect.”
Those closest to him who fully know his story aren’t surprised that Beal has pulled himself up from working two jobs to get by to walking on in junior college to starting for one of college football’s premier programs.
“It doesn’t shock or amaze me at all,” Beal’s stepfather, Mike McKarn, said. “He’s a driven young man. He’s got gifts, but his work ethic is incredible. His attitude toward life is incredible.
“Once he’d made up his mind to play college ball, nothing was going to stop him.”