Garwo Credits Field Vision, Footwork to His First Love: Soccer
Andy Backstrom (@andybackstrom)Publisher
Boston College running back Pat Garwo III has been scoring since he was 4 years old—well, not on the gridiron.
“A lot of people back home say my best sport’s soccer,” Garwo said Thursday after spring practice.
Home for Garwo is Levittown, Pennsylvania. In other words, Bucks County, which neighbors Philadelphia. But his family is from Liberia, a country on the West African coast, where American football is an afterthought.
“Football’s not a sport in Liberia,” Garwo said. “So my mom had this rule where we weren’t gonna play football. I played soccer. That was my No. 1 sport.”
Garwo played forward and sometimes center mid. But he was a striker at heart. The 5-foot-8, 208-pound redshirt junior was constantly running and, as he says, scoring.
Soccer was his “thing.”
“It still is,” Garwo said.
He watches it with his family, his dad in particular, and will even play a bit when he’s home.
His switch to football wasn’t necessarily seamless. It started with him playing “kill the man with the ball” in late middle school. He joined some older kids in his neighborhood for the game. Then, in eighth grade, he experimented with playing both soccer and football.
Garwo broke his leg playing soccer, not football, and that’s what tipped the scale, ironically. By the time high school rolled around, he was all in on football, despite his limited knowledge of the game.
“I had a physical nature, but I didn’t know anything about football,” Garwo said. “I didn’t know the holes until like ninth grade.”
But Garwo calls himself a “big learner,” and he proved that at Conwell-Egan Catholic, where he became Pennsylvania’s highest-rated running back and the state’s No. 9 overall prospect in 2019. He set the school’s single-season rushing record with 1,879 yards as a junior. Then he one-upped himself, piling up 1,922 rushing yards and 29 touchdowns as a senior, leaving as Conwell-Egan’s all-time scoring leader.
“It’s a gift,” BC left tackle Jack Conley said when describing what it’s like to block for Garwo.
“Pat’s got the best vision I’ve ever seen. He’ll be looking this way and make a cut this way because he sees out of the corner of his eye. It’s crazy.”
Garwo is coming off a breakout 2021 campaign, during which he was second-team All-ACC after becoming the 19th Eagle in single-season program history to eclipse 1,000 yards on the ground. After carrying the ball a combined 51 times his first two years in Chestnut Hill and entering this past season fourth on the depth chart, Garwo emerged as the bell cow.
He was so good BC pretty much ditched its running back by committee approach. Garwo had four games where he went over the century mark, and he found the end zone seven times.
He credits his shifty footwork to his soccer days, but he says that his vision and anticipation have always been a strength, regardless of the sport he played growing up, whether it was basketball, track and field or even baseball.
“I think from soccer, just always knowing where the next pass will be or basketball, knowing the next cut,” Garwo said. “I think I always just had that vision, and I translate that to the football field.”
When Garwo breaks it down, it’s simple. He reacts. And, when he reacts, his feet go where his eyes go.
He’s not focused on numbers. His on-field goals for next year involve taking control of the running back room, shoring up pass protection and ball security.
And, above all else, Garwo hasn’t forgotten his roots: his first sport, and the people that helped him get here.
“My goals outside of football are more purpose driven for family, leading back home for the people in Bucks County, Philadelphia watching me,” Garwo said.
“I know my ‘why’ at the end of the day. I have my family in my locker, and I just continue to push for them."
