Kheuangthirath Special As His Name
Bill Cubit says he’s been around only one other football player who had such a commanding presence.
“When he’s on the sideline and he goes into the game or when you a call a play to him, there’s just something about it,” the Widener University coach said. “The only guy I can remember coaching with that was Emmitt.”
Yes, THAT Emmitt. Cubit was the quarterback coach at Florida when Emmitt Smith was running through the SEC.
Cubit isn’t saying Boonta Kheuangthirath (KUNG-tee-rath) is as good as pro football’s best back. Division III Widener plays Albright, not Auburn. Kheuangthirath is 5-foot-6, 146 pounds, not 5-9, 209 pounds. If he makes millions, it’ll probably be as a portfolio manager, not as a football player.
What he is saying is that the senior wide receiver-punt returner has the same kind of ability to make people take notice.
“Emmitt was just a presence. You knew he was in the room,” Cubit said. “In our meetings here, (Kheuangthirath) might sometimes be late because he’s got a lab, and when he walks in the room, all of a sudden there’s something that changes.”
The compliment embarrasses Kheuangthirath. “That’s a lot to say,” he said. “I’m astonished.”
Astonishing might describe the accomplishments and saga of Kheuangthirath, whose journey to this campus outside Philadelphia began in Laos 21 years ago and had stops in Thailand and Manheim, Pa.
He is the second of two children of Sana and Boonmee Kheuangthirath, who was a high school principal in Laos before the communists took power in 1975.
In the purge that followed the takeover, an estimated 60,000 middle- and upper-class Laotians were rounded up and sent to re-education centers and labor camps.
Boonmee Kheuangthirath said he was one of those detained, but he managed to elude his captors after about six months.
“A lot of my friends, they did not escape the country and they died in prison,” he said.
While police occupied his home, waiting for him, Kheuangthirath fled to Thailand. Three years later, he sent for his family. In 1980, they emigrated to the United States, settling in Lancaster County, Pa.
Boonta Kheuangthirath was 4 when he left Laos and has few memories of his days there.
He does plan to go back for a visit this summer after graduation. “Our history’s back there,” he said. “That’s where my family originated and I want to see what it’s like.”
It’s unlikely any of his relatives in Laos will be impressed by his football career, although they might be impressed with the career he wants to pursue after college - investment manager.
For now, he owns the Widener record for receptions (142) and receiving yards (2,342) and is two scores short of the school record for touchdowns.
His three touchdowns in one game earlier this year tied a school mark, and he will finish his career second in combined yardage to another small Pioneer who went on to make a pretty good name for himself in the NFL, Billy “White Shoes” Johnson.
His size was the reason Kheuangthirath’s parents initially wouldn’t allow him to play football.
“I didn’t want him to get hurt,” his father said.
But his older brother, Savath, helped persuade his parents to let him play, and a weightlifting program added 15 pounds of muscle in high school.
“I gained speed and strength,” he said.
Speed is what made Cubit go after Kheuangthirath, even after he had signed a letter of intent to attend Division II Millersville.
Kheuangthirath’s first few months at Widener were difficult, but things changed when he caught 10 passes for 200 yards in the seventh game of his freshman season.
“He didn’t understand the passing game or how to run routes,” Cubit said. “But he had an intense desire to really be good.”
Good and durable. Kheuangthirath, a starter for all four years, hasn’t missed a game.
“He’s taken some big hits,” said Cubit.