CSUN’s Mack Chases Goals, Opponents With Equal Zeal

When Teddy Mack, a 5-foot-10, 195-pound linebacker, first arrived at Cal State Northridge football practice this summer as a walk-on, expectations weren’t high.

Coaches’ expectations, that is.

Mack was confident it was only a matter of time before he would earn a scholarship. Turns out he was right.

Mack shed walk-on status during the first weeks of preseason drills and also shattered his image as a little guy. Few Matador defenders have contributed more than Mack.

“Right now he’s the glue to our defense,” said Ron Ponciano, Northridge’s defensive coordinator. “He just runs around and throws his body at anything he can.”

Mack, a junior who plays nearly every down, leads the Matadors in tackles with 67--17 more than runner-up Richard Pesti. His 37 solos are nearly double that of any other Matador.

“It’s not about size,” Mack said. “It’s about pursuit.”

Simple enough. Relentlessly chase the ballcarrier all over the field and eventually you will catch him.

Somehow, that’s a fitting job for someone who has been seeking his rightful place in college football ever since he suffered a high school knee injury.

Mack was a three-year starter at running back and linebacker at Kearny High in San Diego. During a passing-league game in 1991, the summer before his senior year, he put a fake on a defender and, “I went one way and my knee just didn’t go. You could hear a pop.”

Mack suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee. He managed to play that fall with a high-tech brace--not exactly the kind of thing college football coaches want to see on players they are recruiting.

After the season, Mack had knee surgery and figured his life as a football player was over.

He enrolled at Grambling, and tried out once for the football team, but he was one of about 250 players shooting for 25 walk-on positions.

So much for that idea.

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Mack paid his way through Grambling with the help of grants and student loans. After two years, though, the financial demands became too great and he returned to San Diego.

Mack enrolled at Mesa College, just up the street from his house, to get his Associate in Arts degree and try to play football again. He started at Mesa last fall and had a good year, but still didn’t get a scholarship offer.

The only college football option he had was Missouri Western. Coaches there recruited his roommate and, after seeing film of Mack, told him he could tag along and come out as a walk-on.

The Missouri Western assistant who had seen Mack’s film? Ron Ponciano.

After Ponciano become defensive coordinator at Northridge last summer, and after Missouri Western doctors told Mack they wouldn’t allow him to play unless he wore a $500 knee brace that he had to pay for, Mack’s best option was to follow Ponciano to Northridge.

Northridge, you’ll recall, was letting just about anyone with two legs try out this summer, so Mack was welcomed among many walk-ons.

He knew he would quickly distance himself from the pack, though.

“As soon as we got gear I knew I would [get a scholarship],” Mack said. “I just had to show these coaches my versatility.”

Said Ponciano: “He surprised me with his durability and his toughness. He’s a walk-on and you don’t think they are that tough and that effective, but he came out and proved he was better than the kids who were getting money, so Coach [Dave Baldwin] gave him money.”

Mack made an impression on his teammates too.

“When I first saw Teddy I knew he was going to be real good,” said junior safety James Woods, Northridge’s most-experienced defensive player. “He has a real aggressive attitude. Some guys just have that look that you can tell they are players.”

Mack’s job description at Northridge is simple: tackle.

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He’s listed as a linebacker, but really he is an all-purpose defender. Sometimes he lines up close to the line of scrimmage, sometimes he is outside, going one on one with a receiver, and sometimes he’s lined up in the wrong place altogether.

It’s sort of a joke around Northridge practice, when Baldwin precedes many plays by yelling: “Are you where you are supposed to be, Teddy Mack?”

You can’t argue with the results, though, because no matter where he is when the play starts, he’s usually in the same place when it ends: on top of the guy with the ball.