The Breacher’s Playbook

Chapter One

2013 Camp Kenosha…The University of Wisconsin – Parkside Campus & Northwestern University Summer Football Training Camp

The nondescript Navy duffle bag was tossed onto the nearest bed in the dorm suite. Northwestern University held their summer football training camp each year on the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Parkside (UWP) in Kenosha, Wisconsin, some 55 miles north of Evanston, Illinois. Kenosha is the fourth largest city in Wisconsin located on the southwestern shore of Lake Michigan. Kenosha is a satellite city within the greater Chicago metropolitan area. The campus is a tree-lined Rockwell painting comprised of just under 5,000 students amidst 15 Gothic and Georgian style buildings surrounded by restored prairies, oak & maple forests, and meandering creeks.

Novak surveyed the dorm room he had been assigned with three other linebackers. Roger Dixon, Peter Branch and Marty Reyes were at the team meeting that Novak was expected to attend. The UWP dorm room had a plethora of electronic gear set-up like a Best Buy showroom. There were two flat screen televisions, video game consoles and a Harmon Kardon high-performance audio/video receiver that resembled a recording studio. The receiver was a seven-channel surround sound receiver with HDMI 2.0 upscaling to 1080p. The AVR boosted 40 watts on five channels to drive the home theater speakers with authority. Jesus Christ! Novak dabbled in Call of Duty on various bases and some SEALs acted as consultants for Treyarch, but gamers were not generally in Deklan’s wheelhouse for running mates. Novak brought some gym clothes, one pair of jeans, tee shirts, running shoes and his Navy skivvies. Petty Officer First Class Deklan Novak hadn’t played football for almost fifteen years. Novak’s last game was the playoff loss during the Illinois State High School 7A tournament in 1999. Deklan was one of 27 players in 2013 invited to Northwestern University’s summer football camp as walk-on players. The Big Ten allowed 112 roster spots that included 85 scholarship players. At Northwestern, the walk-on roster spots were predetermined due to the difficult admissions standards and the cost to attend Northwestern University. Deklan Novak had a spot on the 112-man roster before he arrived at camp.

Novak headed to the main auditorium where the entire team was meeting at summer camp for the first time. There was a pre-camp meeting on the Evanston campus during the week prior to summer training camp. Deklan Novak was unable to attend the team meeting in Evanston when his roster spot was introduced to the team. Novak was training 88 candidates during their boot camp so that hopefully those candidates received an invitation to attend BUD/S training in Coronado, California following boot camp graduation. Novak and one other Navy SEAL were under the command of Master Chief Evan Kerr and assigned to Great Lakes for the purpose of teaching BUD/S candidates how to train for the toughest training in the military. (PO1) Deklan Novak’s job at Great Lakes Naval Recruit Training Command (RTC Great Lakes) was to skim the top off the candidate pool and eliminate the Navy SEAL hopefuls that had zero chance to make it through BUD/, since once accepted into BUD/S training, the average dropout rate exceeded 80%. The NU football team was also told at their pre-summer camp meeting that an active-duty Navy SEAL was a full-time student at Northwestern University. The same Navy SEAL was also a BUD/S instructor at Great Lakes Naval Recruit Training Command in Waukegan and would be a first-year linebacker for the Wildcats in 2013. The football team meeting room fell as silent as a mid-term final exam at the McCormick School of Engineering.

NU Head Coach Lance Adams played Mike linebacker also known as middle linebacker for the Wildcats from 1993 to 1996. Northwestern was 10 and 1 during the 1995 season and Adams led the school to the 1996 Rose Bowl. Adams was drafted in the fourth round of the 1997 NFL Draft by the Pittsburgh Steelers, but injuries ended his playing career early. NU Head Coach Lance Adams never imagined that Novak would play one down during a game, but once Deklan Novak secured his enrollment at Northwestern, Adams knew the intangibles brought to the locker room by an active-duty Navy SEAL could be invaluable. From one meeting, Adams knew that Deklan Novak carried with him the credo of self-accountability, a concept Adams held as essential to facing adversity. In addition, Lance Adams was fascinated by the toughness necessary to become a Navy SEAL and selfishly, Adams sought out the friendship with Deklan Novak for himself as much as for the team. Lance Adams had three sons, and the lessons Novak could pass down had to make any man a better father, coach, and person. Football skills aside, Adams knew that Deklan Novak had earned much more than a roster spot on his football team. Relentless was a term often associated with a great football player. On the day Deklan Novak asked if he could play football for Northwestern University, Lance Adams had been introduced to what relentless truly was. Awarding an active-duty Navy SEAL a roster spot was not a gift. Lance Adams was honored to have Deklan Novak on the team.

Lance Adams brought Deklan Novak and a former Navy SEAL, David Talbert, previously stationed at (NAVSTA) Great Lakes over to the NU practice facility in 2012 to address the team on what a training commitment meant, looked like and smelled like. Talbert wrote a bestselling biography after he left the SEAL Teams that detailed a troubled childhood, overwhelming poverty, alcohol, and drug abuse that eventually turned into a ten-year stint with the most elite military unit in the world. Navy SEALs went through two years of hell for a lifetime of respect. Adams met with Deklan Novak in his office after Talbert’s speech to the team. David Talbert was signing copies of his book for the team. At that meeting, Deklan Novak asked Head Coach Lance Adams if he would consider allowing an older dude to try out for the team next year as a walk-on. Novak explained that he did not have an impressive high school resume and showed the decorated Big Ten Head Coach his credentials.

“Hell yes!” Coach Adams blurted out. Adams was taller than Deklan Novak and twelve years older, but still looked like he could drive a blocking sled through a steel door by himself. Adams was molded in the image of a lifelong Marine although he had not served in the military. The close-cropped hair and square jaw mirrored the image of Tom Highway from the movie, Heartbreak Ridge. “I’ll hook you up with the recruiting department on the admissions process.” Adams announced. “I am relatively certain that you will have to score a 1300 on the SAT to have a shot at getting into Northwestern. If you get into Northwestern, you will be a part of our team. Walk-ons are treated the same as any scholarship player except their tuition is not part of the football experience. How big are you, Deklan?”

“I am 6’ 3” tall and 235 pounds, sir.” Deklan replied.

“When did you last play football?” Adams continued. Adams knew he was staring at a linebacker and a special team’s player.

“In high school at Loyola Academy in Wilmette. My last year was 1999.” Novak thought that might be the deal killer.

“Train hard between now and next summer. Football training is specific. Keep me posted on the training and I’ll get updates on the admissions process. I look forward to seeing you in pads.” Adams directed, looking at Novak directly in the eyes. Novak knew the Big Ten Head Coach meant what he said.

“Hooyah, sir!” replied Novak and they shook hands. Novak departed that 2012 meeting to find his author buddy, ready to get to work.

Novak knew his first task was to set out to meet the standards necessary to be accepted into Northwestern University. The consensus was that Novak needed to score between 1300-1500 on the SAT, graduate in the top 10% of his high school class (that ship had sailed), earn a grade point average near or at 4.0 in high school (that ship never arrived to sail away) and submit letters of recommendation from a wide variety of prominent individuals. Of all the admissions requirements expected of him, Novak knew the letters of recommendation would be the easiest to bring to fruition.

Novak was training potential BUD/S candidates at NAVSTA Great Lakes every morning in 2012. Novak’s pre-BUD/S classes normally numbered 40 to 50 Seamen Recruits. At the start of each two-week class, Novak asked how many recruits had graduated college. Many hands were raised. Novak then asked how many college graduates graduated from an elite school like Harvard, Stanford, Yale, or MIT. Only a few hands remained up. Novak picked one recruit during each class to tutor him after the boot camp day was completed. There were no perks for the recruit chosen except that a Navy SEAL acknowledged his/her existence.

Deklan Novak attacked his SAT challenge like he attacked any challenge in his life. Novak eventually scored over 1300 on the SAT and was accepted as a full-time student into Northwestern University. Novak was not naïve to think that the letters of recommendation received by Northwestern University on his behalf from two U.S. Senators, and several ranking members within the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) did not carry substantial weight. Admiral William McRaven, Commander of (USSOCOM) based at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida possibly tipped the scales for Novak’s admission. The Commander at USSOCOM had the following units under command: United States Army Special Operations Command (USASOC), United States Naval Special Warfare Command (NSW) Navy SEALs, United States Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command (MARSOC), Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC), and Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) to protect and advance United States policies and objectives. In addition, the resume from Admiral McRaven included the co-command of Operation Neptune Spear with the CIA and the SEAL Team Six op on May 2, 2011, that successfully located and killed Osama Bin laden. Most applicants to college were able to list high school participation in band, drama club, debate club, letter sports and intramural athletics. Novak’s application instead had multiple wartime deployments to fight terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan over a decade, a leadership position at the only Navy boot camp in the United States, and graduation from BUD/S, what most often had been described as the toughest training in the world. The recommendation letters sealed the deal.

Novak’s football experience heading into his first season with NU most likely was destined to produce a zero chance to see the field as an active player, while adding to the grueling schedule of a student athlete and an active-duty Navy SEAL.  Novak’s marriage that eventually produced four boys was disintegrating daily under his blind eyes. Deklan Novak’s wife, Amber Bale Novak, moved to San Diego while he was a BUD/S candidate in 2006. After the move to San Diego, Amber and Deklan were married and shared an off-base apartment during the 16-month Navy SEAL training regimen that included BUD/S Phase One-physical conditioning (7 weeks), Phase Two-combat diving (7 weeks) and Phase Three-land warfare (7 weeks) training. Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE) School and SEAL Qualification Training (SQT) followed to complete arguably the most intense and grueling training in the world. The marriage had been rocky during BUD/S and continued to be a roller-coaster during the decade-plus years that Deklan Novak was deployed around the world as a member of SEAL Team One. There were obvious reasons why there were few members of SEAL Team Six, officially known as the Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU) Green Team who were married. Finally, a stable assignment to (NAVSTA Great Lakes) came to fruition for Deklan Novak and retirement from the Navy was in sight. Amber had dreamed of the days when Deklan was no longer a Navy SEAL, but she had not planned for the additional time apart that Division I college football required.

The auditorium at UWP was filled with the entire team, coaches, the Athletic Director Jim Tunney, the Assistant Athletic Director Manny Griffith, nutrition staff, recruiting staff, support staff and conditioning people. Defensive coordinator Behr Thomas was speaking to the team. Head Coach Lance Adams was seated directly behind the podium where Coach Thomas was speaking. The seating aisles rose gradually from the front of the room and the entrance door was off to the side of the main stage. There was a video screen lit up behind Coach Thomas illuminating the iconic stone and iron archway synonymous with the main Northwestern campus and located on Sheridan Road at the apex of the lakefront acreage. Deklan Novak entered the large, tiered meeting space and Coach Thomas stopped talking to see who was interrupting his time before the team.

(PO1) Deklan Novak wore Navy shorts, flip-flops, and a UDT/SEAL instructor tee shirt. Novak had full-sleeve tattoos on both arms, a chest tattoo was barely visible inside the neck of his tee shirt and the new team member had a three-day stubble on a premature gray beard. Novak’s arms looked like vein roadmaps on a body builder. Novak’s tattoo’s included a John Henry tattoo from a Johnny Cash ballad, a tattoo honoring Deklan’s brother Danny or DJ who passed away in 2008, a tattoo representing a chaotic world descending into order into a labyrinth into the mind, soul, and self, a bone frog tattoo that was the coveted rite of passage as a Navy SEAL who had done his first deployment. The room was dead silent and the stereotypical image that most young men had of a Navy SEAL, came to life before them like a video game mythical figure larger than Kratos.

The tattooed warrior also wore an image of Virgil crossing the river Styx on his way to pick up Dante, a tattoo of a skeleton angel whispering into the ear of a naked woman, the names of his sons tattooed on his chest, the three-headed hound of hell, and a large tattoo of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Novak slid his flip-flops across the tile floor to minimize the slapping as he looked for a seat. The team remained silent but took in the new member like they were watching Marvin Hagler ascend to the ring.

“Welcome, Mr. Novak.” Coach Thomas announced and did not reprimand the late arrival. Adams had told his staff what to expect and when to expect it regarding Deklan Novak. “We had our little introduction session on campus last week before our annual sojourn to Kenosha. Each player stood up and introduced themselves. Please Mr. Novak, introduce yourself to the team and tell us a little about where you are from and why you decided to attend Northwestern University.” Behr Thomas smiled with a snarky and sarcastic grin.

Thomas was less than one year older than Deklan Novak.  Barely 33 years old, Behr Thomas had played free safety for the University of Michigan, gaining a reputation for hitting like a freight train. Thomas was drafted into the NFL by the Chicago Bears and like Brian Urlacher, Behr Thomas was moved from safety to outside linebacker as a pro. Behr Thomas put on an additional twenty pounds and thrived on the outside in the Bears 3-4 defense. Seven concussions in five years, however, ended Behr’s professional career and led him to the sidelines and to the podium in the UWP. The team waited in silence as Deklan Novak found a seat, turned, and addressed the team.

“Greetings.” Novak began. This introduction was going to be short and vague. “My name is Deklan Novak. I grew up in the south suburbs of Chicago and I moved to the North Shore when I was in middle school. I went to Loyola Academy during high school and followed the Wildcats closely as they played fifteen minutes from my house. I joined the Navy in 2006 and enrolled at Northwestern last spring. I got a late start, but I promise not to bring my walker to the practice fields.” Novak sat down amid the laughter. When the noise faded, one of the linebackers assigned to room with Novak stood up and asked a question on everyone’s mind.

“Are you a Navy SEAL, dude?” Marty Reyes asked and knew the answer. Reyes was from Anderson High School in Austin, Texas and was raised among Texas royalty. His father was a PRCA World Champion Bull Rider, and his great-grandfather was a renowned bootlegger around the Texas capital during Prohibition and made a fortune from purchasing land in Austin after the Great Depression. Football was king in Texas and Reyes was revered in his home state. Reyes clearly wanted to mark his territory early on.

“Yes, I am a Navy SEAL.” Novak replied and the next question was as expected as the questions received by Santa with any child on his lap.

“How many guys have you killed?” Reyes followed the script as expected and one that Deklan Novak heard often. Whenever people met a Navy SEAL, the question inevitably arose. Marty Reyes started nodding like a bobblehead doll, turned to his teammates, and waited for his raucous adulation. A few smattering retorts followed in support of the Reyes inquiry. All eyes returned to Deklan Novak.

“None,” Deklan Novak stood while he replied and sat back down.

“Bullshit!” Reyes shot back. “Don’t be shy my man or what does your shirt say…UDT SEAL Instructor? Power Five football is intense. We are big boys, here. We know you were deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq on multiple occasions. Coach Adams told us you were a breacher on SEAL Team One. You were the first one into the shit on every mission. How many dudes did you blow away? Seriously, dude…more or less than a hundred? Just tell us that much.”

“My apologies,” Deklan Novak stood back up. “My mind gets a little foggy sometimes. I took part in Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force-Afghanistan, also designated as Task Force Dagger, which was asked to conduct Unconventional Warfare in Northern Afghanistan. We were very good at killing the bad guys. The most difficult task during the war on terror was not killing the bad guys but finding the bad guys. To find the bad guys, we had to trust or depend on intel from the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1386 authorizing the International Security Assistance Force (or ISAF) which was primarily made up from Afghan and Iraqi soldiers working for the United States Special Operations Command, better known as (USSOCOM).”

Novak paused, allowing the acronym vocabulary of the military world to sink in. “The local population did not welcome the United States military. We had built-in enemies within our own command. 9/11 gave Cheney the public appetite to manufacture a war. There were no weapons of mass destruction or WMD in Iraq. We entered Iraq in 2003 to destroy the WMD and kill Saddam Hussein. By the end of 2003, the WMD searches were aborted, and Saddam was captured.”

“We remained in Iraq until 2011, building 505 bases occupied by 170,000 men and women in uniform and another 135,000 private military contractors working in Iraq. Money in war is not made by invasion, victory and exit. Money is made by occupation. I’m not sure what your name is my friend, but we didn’t count kills, we counted days alive. During Operation Enduring Freedom, we geared up at Forward Operating Base (FOB) Chapman or at FOB Salerno to launch direct action combat missions centered on locating and neutralizing high value Taliban targets.” Novak paused again before continuing. “FOB Chapman was named after Sergeant First Class Nathan Chapman, the first U.S. soldier killed by enemy fire during the Afghanistan war in 2002. Improvised explosive devices (IED), caused almost 70% of all coalition casualties in Afghanistan and Iraq. We had to constantly be aware of roadside IEDs, house-borne IEDs (HBIED), and vehicle-borne IEDs (VBIED). Insurgents worked hard at remote detonations and roadside death traps to kill American and coalition forces,” Novak paused again, his mind recalling those memories.

“Often, in Afghanistan,” he continued, “when we were moving between FOB Chapman and FOB Salerno, we would drive in a two or three truck convoy in the dead of night, fully blacked out with me and the other drivers on night vision goggles at hyper fast speed going nut to butt so we couldn’t give the IEDs enough time to detonate accurately. The trucks we drove were Toyota Hilux pick-up trucks with a ton of added armor and 3,500 pounds of hidden equipment on board. Each truck cost the U.S. government north of $300,000 and the vehicles could blend in with local traffic if necessary. The trucks were armored like an M1 Abrams tank, carrying comms and satellite systems designed to shut down all cell phone use in the area and to call down air support from the U.S. led Combined Air Power Transition Force. Our missions usually had an overhead convoy of Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jets flying above. The Super Hornets carried a standard load of a 20mm M61A2 Vulcan Gatling gun with 578 20 mm projectiles carried for short range work. The eleven hardpoints allowed for a mixed ordinance carrying capability. A hardpoint is an attachment to the mounting frame on the aircraft that carried missiles, bombs, rocket pods and jettisonable fuel tanks. The wingtip launches were typically reserved for 2 x AIM-9 Sidewinder short-range missiles.” Novak paused, knowing he was throwing a lot of military jargon and specs at his audience.

“The bad guys couldn’t detonate their roadside bombs,” he continued explaining, “because we shut down their comms from the trucks. We drove those mother fuckers at 70 to 80 mph on one-lane dirt roads that were no wider than a standard twin bed, in pitch black darkness and we were bumper to bumper in a convoy that never knew if we missed the one comms connection that might blow us into a pink mist. We were big boys too, my friend, so I guess we both can relate to intense.” Deklan Novak sat down for a third time. The auditorium was as silent as a country road at four o’clock in the morning.

“Drop it, Reyes.” Dusty Lindell stood up and addressed their starting Mike linebacker. Dusty Lindell was the Junior starting fullback and one of the team Captains. “When Deklan Novak is ready to talk to you or to anyone else on this team about his experience in combat, then he will do so on his own terms. Welcome, dude.” Lindell addressed Novak directly. “Don’t mind Marty, he wears a Call of Duty tee shirt under his uniform on game day.”

“Good call, Dusty.” Behr Thomas took back the reins. Deklan Novak did not respond in any way. “Shut the fuck up, Reyes, and learn what you can from Mr. Novak. I am certain he has been through training that we can only imagine. Hell Marty, Mr. Novak may bring you a Navy shot glass from the commissary at Great Lakes if you’re nice to him.” Coach Thomas smiled and continued. “Thank you, Deklan. We all appreciate your service. Our sole goal here is to prepare and win the Big Ten title. Anything that occurs after that must be precipitated by a Big Ten title. If anyone in this room doesn’t plan to win the Big Ten title this year, please pack up your shit and go home. I’m not here to monitor a juvenile territorial testosterone contest. I know Coach Adams doesn’t give a shit if you, Marty, want to wear your Lone Star crap on your sleeve, but here we earn our positions and our playing time. The starting lineup is not decided on by a high school state title or by how many recruiting letters you received since your acne started to recede. Positions are earned on the field and that starts at 6 a.m. tomorrow morning. My defense is a meritocracy, boys. Reyes, you can ask Mr. Novak what that means.” And with that, Coach Thomas gave the floor back to the head coach. Marty Reyes did not know what to think of his new roommate and he had no idea what a fucking meritocracy was.

“I hope all of you get the chance to play in the NFL.” Head Coach Lance Adams took the podium and began his closing remarks. “The reality is that most of you will not play in the NFL. My job may appear to be molding the best football players I can mold over the next four years or however many years you have remaining on our football team. That is not my job. My job is to mold the best men I can mold over the time you spend on this football team. This is not about the next four years. It’s about the next forty years.” Coach Adams paused. The coach looked over his team as everyone remained quiet. He folded his hands and brought them to his mouth and continued. “Aristotle claimed that character develops over time as one acquires habits from parents and community, but first through reward and punishment. The conclusion is simple. Character is learned and the harder you fight for it, the better men we become. I agree. Character is the only thing not driven by money. Genetics have nothing to do with it. You cannot steal it, find it, or fake it. Thank you for the privilege to coach you all. Now, get ready for tomorrow because you will be taught to get comfortable being uncomfortable and you will know where that came from soon enough.”

Lance Adams stepped away from the podium. Behr Thomas reclaimed the podium and waited for his head coach to exit the auditorium.

“When will we know if we are good enough to win?” Thomas began and paused as he side-eyed Deklan, as if to say that Novak wasn’t the only BMF in the room. “Walter Payton was quoted as saying…when you are good at something, you’ll tell everyone. When you are great at something, they’ll tell you.” Coach Thomas spit on the floor. He looked around and then took a large mouthful of water from his water bottle as the players watched. Thomas swirled his intake, and then spit out a torrent of saliva-infused liquid onto the stage, threw his water bottle, half-full, into the players. He had one more message and he screamed at his team. “We are not going to tell anyone this year about how good we are. Starting tomorrow, all your communication will be done with your pads, your helmet and your fucking laser focused resolution to kick seven shades of shit out of the team or the man in front of you!” And with that, Behr Thomas followed Coach Adams out of the lecture hall auditorium.