It took until midway through his junior season for Arkeith Brown to find a regular starting job in the Texas A&M secondary.
The senior admits there were times that he wondered if the day would come. Other times, he wondered why it hadn't.
Brown remained patient, thanks to a few calls home to El Campo.
"Since my freshman year, I'd been in that predicament, not really playing much," Brown said. "I talked to my grandmother and mother, and they'd tell me to just keep working hard, don't get down and it will pay off. I knew God had a game plan for me, so I kept working and working and kept getting better.
"I really didn't let it faze me too much, but, yeah, it came to my head a couple of times: Is this game really for you? Is this what you are here for? And now it's starting to pay off. I never quite knew why, because I had a lot of people telling me you are our best corner and you are this and you are that, but I never let it get me down or got mad at anybody."
With Danny Gorrer ahead of him on the depth chart last season, it didn't appear Brown would get to start. But a midsesason injury to Gorrer opened the door for the former Ricebird.
Brown, who credits Gorrer for helping him keep his head up when he was on the second team, has started 10 straight games since then, leading A&M with eight pass breakups over the second half of the 2007 season. He paces the team this season with four and has one of the Aggies' three interceptions.
"When you are playing behind a guy like Danny who's had experience and been here, you don't think there is any light at the end of the tunnel," said A&M assistant coach Van Malone, who coached Brown for two years before moving over to safeties this season. "He's had the opportunity to feel like the position was his, and he's fought for it at all times.
"He's one of the best athletes on our team, great jumping ability, definitely really good speed. The thing that had held him back was he hadn't been fully committed to being a football player, and that's what I see now, taking it to a level where he loves football and he loves what we are doing out there."
Brown, a track and field standout at El Campo who toyed with the idea of joining A&M's track team this spring, has shown he can do more than defend the pass, recording 30 tackles last year as a starter and picking up 18 (sixth on the team) in the first four games this season.
Brown has a new position coach this season in Charles McMillian. He was worried, at first, about having to start over under a new staff, but Brown says he enjoys the assertive approach under the new coaches, believing it's a better fit for himself, Gorrer and the others in the secondary.
It's showing on the field.
"One of the things he's really made a conscious effort to improve is his aggressiveness," Malone said. "One thing about Arkeith is when he knows what to do, he'll do it 100 mph, on the football field, in the classroom. Sometimes with seniors, the light goes on and they understand that 'this is my job,' and I've seen him take a much more professional attitude about his preparation."
Brown didn't have much to do against Army, with the Black Knights throwing only four passes, completing one for four yards.
But with A&M's Big 12 schedule beginning Saturday in Stillwater, Okla., Brown knows that's about to change. He welcomes the challenge.
"At cornerback, I feel like we haven't really been tested, but we've done well so far," Brown said of being ranked No. 5 nationally against the pass. "We have to keep working on the little things like fundamentals, and when that day comes, we'll find out."
The 6-foot, 175-pound Brown could be matched up Saturday against one of the best and most physical receivers in the Big 12 in Oklahoma State's Dez Bryant.
Bryant, a 6-2, 210-pound sophomore, has 22 receptions for 444 yards -- third in the league -- and six touchdowns, which is three more than A&M has allowed all season.
"I'm just going to go into the game with the mindset I play corner, he plays receiver, I got a scholarship, he's got a scholarship, I'm good, he's good, and go out there and cover the receivers to the best of my ability," Brown said. "That's how I go out there for any game, pretty much confident, playing my technique and doing what I do best."
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NOTES -- As a senior in high school, Arkeith Brown had three interceptions in a playoff game against Texas City. ... Brown high jumped 6-11 in high school and won the Class 4A state bronze medal in the triple jump (47-3). He also was a member of the 800-meter relay team that won the state bronze. He had hoped to participate in track at A&M, but the coaches believed it would hurt his chances at earning playing time in football. ... Brown had entertained ideas of going to Texas but says his high school coach Bob Gillis convinced him to go to A&M for the academics and so his family could be close. El Campo is about 120 miles south of College Station.
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