It’s hard to think of Philip Rivers as a grizzled veteran, an NFL quarterback with a dozen years of experience under his shoulder pads.
It’s hard to think of him as a father of eight, about to celebrate his 15th wedding anniversary to middle high sweetheart Tiffany. In only a few years, if his oldest child gets married and has children at the same age of her parents, he could be a grandfather.
Let that sink in.
For NC State fans, it’s hard think of Rivers as anything except the fresh-faced, 18-year-old kid from Athens, Ala., who arrived in Raleigh with the new millennium in January 2000 as the cornerstone recruit in Chuck Amato’s initial signing class.
He was brash, but classy; young, but mature beyond his years. He and Alabama-born receiver Jerricho Cotchery, his favorite target, established an on-field relationship that created one of the most productive offenses in school history.
Through an NCAA-record 51 consecutive starts, Rivers completely rewrote the NC State and Atlantic Coast Conference record books.
And we were privileged to watch him grow up.
Maybe that’s who we expect to see this weekend, when Rivers returns to campus for the first time since he delivered the school’s 2012 commencement address at PNC Arena. It’ll be his first ever appearance at the annual Kay Yow Spring Football Game and Friday evening’s popular player reunion at Carter-Finley Stadium.
Surely, he’ll get an incomparable ovation when he’s introduced on Saturday at the intra-squad scrimmage that concludes spring practice. He’ll have one more chance to savor the emotion of walking onto the field at Carter-Finley Stadium.
Like quarterback Roman Gabriel, running back Ted Brown and just a few others before him, Rivers was a game-changer in Wolfpack red-and-white, a nationally celebrated player who was destined for even bigger things. He helped establish Amato’s program in Raleigh, with four consecutive bowl games and a list of records and honors that would fill up the Internet.
His remarkable maturity, on and off the field, belied his youthful looks. The beat-up gold Ford Taurus he drove around campus hardly indicated that he would one day earn almost $200 million as a professional quarterback.
From his first game — a double-overtime shocker in a driving rainstorm over Arkansas State — to his last — a blowout victory over Kansas in the Tangerine Bowl when he and Cotchery put the record books out of reach for mortals — Rivers tried to take the Wolfpack to unprecedented heights.
That happened during his sophomore year, when he engineered a victory over Florida State in Tallahassee, and during his junior season, on New Year’s Day 2003, when he and the Wolfpack defense crushed the quarterback’s childhood favorite team, Notre Dame, in the Gator Bowl.
By the time he left town in the spring of 2004, with a diploma tucked under one arm and his retired No. 17 jersey under the other, Rivers had become exactly the kind of quarterback the NFL was looking for — tall, smart and able to make quick decisions.
He got it honestly, sitting around the breakfast table with his father, Steve, an Alabama high school football coach who taught his son the X’s and O’s and how to earn his place on the field.
The elder Rivers had a senior quarterback during Philip’s sophomore year that wasn’t as talented but deserved the chance to play. So he started Philip 11 games at linebacker just so his oldest son could get inside the head of a defender.
He learned his competitiveness from his mother and maternal grandfather, neither of whom let up on the youngster when they were playing backyard ballgames or four-hour sessions of Mario Brothers on the family’s primitive Mattel Intellivision gaming system.
As much as he impressed scouts during his Wolfpack playing career, it wasn’t until the Senior Bowl following his senior year that NFL scouts were convinced he would succeed in the NFL. He was taken as the No. 4 pick by the New York Giants, an accomplished, talented player with an unbounded future ahead.
He’s fulfilled, perhaps even exceeded, the high expectations set for him during his career with the San Diego Chargers, the team he was traded to within minutes of being drafted by the Giants. No, he hasn’t won a Super Bowl, like his years-later successor Russell Wilson. And the ever-changing Chargers haven’t been consistently great, though no one could blame that on Rivers.
He’s had an exceptional run that could get him into more than just the NC State Athletic Hall of Fame.
At the age of 34, however, Rivers isn’t too far from the two-minute warning in his career. He recently signed an $84 million contract extension that will take him through the 2019 season, when he will be about the same age as Peyton Manning was when he announced his retirement in February.
Rivers has always envied his former teammates who can make it back to Raleigh for the spring reunion. Living so far away, with so many young kids around the house, it has been difficult for Rivers to return for the event. He’s flying up from the family’s Florida vacation on Friday in order to spend a few days with the Wolfpack.
“It’s been hard for me to get back very often,” Rivers said a few years ago. “Living in San Diego, it’s difficult.
"But I do love the Wolfpack and NC State, and can’t wait until I can come back and be a part of it all again."
Saturday, he’ll have that chance.
You may contact Tim Peeler at tmpeeler@ncsu.edu
