Celebrity status
PULLMAN – Norvell Holmes is a guard on the offensive line, by nature one of the least noticeable positions on the field. So it may come as a surprise to know that of all the players on the Washington State football team, Holmes may be the only one with his own day.
When the students at La Salle Avenue Elementary School in the heart of Los Angeles arrive for class today, it will be Norvell Holmes Day. The senior had a little help in getting a day named in his honor – his mother, Claudia, is a fifth-grade teacher there – but of all the players on the WSU roster, it may be fair that he is the one the children at La Salle will be looking up to.
“The children just love him. Whenever he comes, he’s like a celebrity on campus,” Claudia said from her home in Inglewood, Calif. “He always comes to the school. And that’s not necessarily with me asking or insisting. That’s something that he wants to do.”
At 6-foot-2 and nearly 300 pounds, Holmes is an imposing figure to the youths. Once a student at La Salle, the 23-year-old is nearing a degree in psychology with an eye on graduate school and a career in counseling or research.
Holmes has brought teammates and friends back to La Salle with him in past years to spend time with the children in his mother’s classes and to talk about the opportunities that lie ahead.
“She actually has some of them rooting for Washington State now,” said Holmes, whose team will be facing a more popular USC team on Saturday. “They at least know who I am. They watch the games.”
Holmes and his mother – “best friends,” he calls them – have gotten to be close for plenty of reasons outside the classroom. When Norvell was 13, his father died after an accidental fall at a family wedding. And before that, Norvell’s younger brother, Kenny, was born with a severe form of cerebral palsy.
His younger brother, now 18, doesn’t communicate well and requires constant care, something that Holmes said he expects to be providing one day if his mother no longer can.
“At first I’d look at him and I was mad, because I was like, ‘Man, I’m not going to have a little brother that I can throw the football with,’ ” Holmes said. “But it made me appreciate him so much more, because it taught me not to take stuff for granted. The thing about him, he still every day wakes up with a smile on his face. Every time you see him he’s smiling.”
Mom remembers her older son’s role in a different light.
“We knew (Kenny) was going to have developmental delays seriously,” Claudia said. “And it was always Norvell – and I’m this distraught mother – but it took this 5- or 6-year-old to tell me that everything would be all right.”
Since arriving at WSU, and moving so far away from home, Holmes has dedicated himself in a different way. Charity has become a focal point, and the senior has been a consistent contributor to a number of local and national organizations. After Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast, Holmes and his fraternity helped to organize a campus-wide blood drive.
And his plans for next summer, when football is no longer an all-consuming activity?
“I was thinking about doing this with a couple of people I know, going down to New Orleans and getting hooked up with Habitat for Humanity and just build houses,” Holmes said.
On the field, Holmes had significant back trouble for much of his career, a problem that appears to have subsided this season for the first time in years. So it may not come as much of a surprise that the senior is having a career year as the entire Cougar offensive line plays above expectations.
“Norvell’s overcome so much to be where he is today,” his position coach, George Yarno, said. “A year-and-a-half with back problems and all kinds of things where he really didn’t even practice or do anything. And we had kind of given up on him and said, well, he’ll probably never play again.
“He works as hard and focuses as hard as any kid I’ve ever worked with. That’s why he’s the player he is now. He’s made himself into one.”
About 20 students from La Salle will be at the Los Angeles Coliseum Saturday, the tickets courtesy of a citywide program for youths. But before they get to the game, they’ll spend today learning about one of the players on the field – anonymous no more.
“There are some challenges with some of our students who are here,” Claudia Holmes said. “So just having a day to encourage them to strive to achieve excellence, show them that Norvell was a student there. He attended a second inner-city school and earned a scholarship to a major university. Everybody can strive for excellence. Because you never know what can happen.”