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Comeback Kid Comes Home To The Outback

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By MARTIN FENNELLY

mfennelly@tampatrib.com

Published: January 1, 2009

He walked to a team bus after practice Monday, but he might as well have been dancing in a dream.

"This is hard to beat," Stephen Garcia said.

How can you beat being only 20, just a redshirt freshman, but starting quarterback for Steve Spurrier and South Carolina in a bowl game?

How can you beat playing the Outback Bowl in your own backyard?

How can you beat where you've practiced this week - Jefferson High School, where Garcia threw all those touchdowns for the Dragons? He's using his old high school locker.

"I even hung his high school jersey in there," Jefferson football coach Mike Fenton said. "He's home."

And how - how? - can you beat what Stephen Garcia apparently has beaten, coming from behind, back from his mistakes, from off-field troubles, from two misdemeanor arrests in three weeks before he ever took a snap, from seemingly the brink of dismissal from college?

This morning he'll lead the Gamecocks against Iowa.

Hometown boy.

Hometown bowl.

The perfect script.

"It really is," Garcia said.

Nothing would please his head coach more than a big day from The Comeback Kid.

"Stephen earned his place way down there," Spurrier said. "But he's earned his way back. Hopefully he can go the distance."

Raymond James Stadium will be Garcia Central today, chock full of family and friends. Gary and Debbie Garcia, Stephen's parents, are beaming.

"It's almost scary how this all worked out," Gary Garcia said.

How can you beat this story?

"He hit some adversity and he learned from it," Gary Garcia said. "It's as simple as that."

Garcia has played in only seven games this season, with starts in a loss to LSU and a win against Tennessee. He has shown flashes of very good and flashes of very young.

"He's a leader man," said Kenny McKinley, South Carolina's star receiver. "He's got some swagger."

"He's grown up and matured," South Carolina center Garrett Anderson said. "Everybody makes mistakes. How you come through them is the story."

Garcia enrolled early at Carolina after great grades and 83 passing touchdowns at Jefferson. He was one of Carolina's top recruits, the Golden Boy, a free spirit with long brown hair tied in a ponytail, a rock star before he ever played a down.

Garcia is a smart, interesting kid. In high school, sitting with a reporter, he listed his heroes as Alexander the Great, Achilles and William "Braveheart" Wallace. Garcia recited, from memory, a long passage from Homer's "Iliad."

Then came the odyssey.

Garcia wasn't two months into the 2007 Carolina spring semester when he was arrested for public drunkenness, then a few weeks later for keying a professor's car. He was suspended from spring football.

He fared no better last spring. In March, Garcia was cited by police for underage drinking. He was suspended from football until August. The school booted him from campus housing and banned him from summer school. He underwent counseling, drug and alcohol testing and completed community service. He was on the edge of a cliff.

Now look.

"He has completely stayed out of trouble," Spurrier said. "I think he has matured quite a bit."

Now Garcia's hair, like his life, is closely cropped. Garcia insists that is just a coincidence. "The hair will be back," he said with a grin.

"He used to be like a young rock star, but he's kind of a mellowed down," McKinley said.

There are a lot of Stephen Garcia believers. One is Spurrier's wife, Jerri, who exchanges text messages with Garcia.

"She's a great lady," Garcia said.

"I just adore him," Jerri Spurrier said. "He's a special kid."

She sees Garcia's maturation. It hasn't hurt that 14 months ago Garcia became a father. He and his girlfriend (they've been together since his sophomore year at Jefferson) have a son named Memphys.

There's new life ... and then there's new life.

Today, everyone will be watching Stephen Garcia.

He dug some holes, he has climbed some mountains.

Now look.

Hometown boy.

Hometown bowl.

"The only thing left is to win," Garcia said.

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