TCNJ

33 game with an abiding devotion since he was seven years old and weighed 50 pounds, it was a devastating blow. "Crazy difficult," Nicole recalls. Guido remembers going with his father to the season opener his junior year. He could not bring himself to sit in the stands, among the parents of his teammates, so he and his dad watched from behind an end zone. At halftime, Guido locked eyes with his teammates as they filed past him on their way to the locker room. A few of his closest friends on the team had written his uniform number 9 on their cleats. "I remember seeing the faces of my friends, and I was crushed," Guido recalls. Later, in the locker room, he broke down in tears. A teammate, Anthony Dicicco, wrapped him in a bear hug. Driving home that night with his father, Guido cried the whole way. "At the time, it felt like everything," he says. "It felt like my whole world was gone." His father told him he could make one of two decisions. He could stay on the same path, or he could resolve to turn his life around. "I made the decision that day," Guido says. "It was very simple." ONE FALL NIGHT IN 1999, Guido drove up to TCNJ to watch his cousin, Matt Scaravaglione '04, play football for the Lions. (He'd already been to the campus many times to watch Matt's older brother, Joe '97, who had also played for Coach Hamilton.) Guido was attending Camden County Community College and thinking about joining the Army. He and Matt were best friends and high school teammates, having lived much of their lives three doors apart on Richmond Drive in Washington Township, just a Hail Mary pass from the Atlantic City Expressway. Outside the locker room after the game, Hamilton approached Guido. The Scaravaglione family had told the coach about Guido, told him he might be a good fit for the Lions' football program. Guido was not so sure. How would he pay for it? Besides, he'd already filled out preliminary paperwork for the Army. But Hamilton encouraged Guido to apply to TCNJ. That 10-minute meeting, Guido says today, "definitely changed my life." Guido enrolled at TCNJ the next year as a business major. Scaravaglione introduced him to friends on the team, including his roommates, Bryan Herman '04, Bryan Gallagher '03, and Vince Tardive '04. (Photo, page 46.) Mul- holland would join them a year later. In no time, his cousin's crew became Guido's crew. "He immediately was the most well-liked guy," Scaravaglione says. Mulholland came to know Guido not just as a hard-driven player and student, but as a friend who wasn't afraid to get in his face whenever he messed up off the field. "You really respect people who THEY SAW IN GUIDO THE CONSUMMATE UNDERDOG, A BRASH KID FROM THE SOUTH JERSEY SUBURBS WITH A DOGGED WORK ETHIC AND A PASSION TO SUCCEED. FACING PAGE: COURTESTY GUIDO FAMILY. RIGHT: BILL CARDONI Bro time Bryan Mulholland '05 and Guido reunite at a surprise party for the latter this summer at the shore.

• Cover