CHANDLER, Ariz. - For 17-year-old Zak DeOssie, the summer of 2001 was Fantasy Island. He was a ball boy in training camp for the Patriots, and coach Bill Belichick needed a football. Actually, he needed someone to throw a football.
The Patriots were running seven-on-seven drills, but were down a quarterback. Damon Huard, the third-stringer behind Drew Bledsoe and Tom Brady, was attending a funeral. Brady and Bledsoe had thrown enough passes for the day, but Belichick's rigid routine called for more passing drills, passes Huard would have thrown.
Belichick knew DeOssie played quarterback at Phillips Academy in Andover. He knew that because DeOssie and Belichick's daughter were classmates and friends at Phillips Academy, which is where Belichick attended before enrolling at Wesleyan.
And it was still training camp. So Belichick made the call to DeOssie, who was anything but a wide-eyed youngster. DeOssie had been around football camps and football players most of his life. His father, Steve, played a dozen years in the NFL, with stops with the Cowboys, Giants, Jets, and Patriots. He had played on the 1990 Giants team that won Super Bowl XXV with Bill Parcells as the head coach and Belichick as the defensive coordinator.
"Lots of kids get a job like that and they just are happy to have it," said Steve DeOssie. "But Zak was a kid who looked for extra work."
When Belichick accommodated DeOssie, there was a moment of disbelief. "I thought it was so cool," said Zak DeOssie yesterday, recalling a highlight moment of his youth. I remember on the first snap, when the Patriots saw who was coming in at QB, they didn't say anything, but all of the linebackers blitzed. I just heaved it and Ty Law knocked it down. I threw two more passes which were pretty good to a backup tight end, but he dropped them both. They got on him pretty good. I felt bad about that. But it was a lot of fun."
As DeOssie spoke, he studied his surroundings and laughed. He is having fun as the long snapper for the Giants. The kid from Phillips Academy had grown up and went to college, where he blossomed as a linebacker at Brown.
He came to the Giants last spring, a fourth-round draft pick who made the team as a special teams player and became the long snapper when Ryan Kuehl was injured. On Sunday against the Patriots in Super Bowl XLII, DeOssie will be playing on special teams and making snaps to 41-year-old punter Jeff Feagles, who jokingly calls DeOssie one of his sons.
DeOssie's appearance in Sunday's game will be the 10th time father and son have made it to the Super Bowl, but the first with the same franchise. He said the advice from his father was to do his work, but enjoy the journey.
"I told him I would take care of all the other stuff, the tickets and travel arrangements, and he should just worry about football," said Steve DeOssie, who is part of the media entourage in Arizona covering the Patriots. "I told him to stop and enjoy the moment."
Steve DeOssie said the last 12 months have sped by. "It's been a whirlwind year, from watching him go through the NFL combine, to the NFL draft - Zak was a fourth-round pick - to graduation to coming to the Giants. But I'm not surprised by any of it. Zak was always a focused kid."
Kid is still the operative word in many ways. Before each game, Zak tucks a childhood picture of himself and his sisters Christina and Nichole under his pillow before he goes to sleep.
"A good luck charm," said DeOssie with a laugh. "Those are some of the little things that I do."
He is also the kid with a degree from Brown, who listed Corporate Governance as his favorite economics course because it "covered the fiduciary responsibilities of organizations."
DeOssie says he is not surprised he is in the NFL.
"I knew I would be somewhere," he said. "I didn't think it would be with my dad's old team. But it's been a great thrill, doing something like this with the game I love. It's been a blast. I've learned a lot about the game."
How much he will learn against the Patriots has yet to be determined, but the kid who played quarterback in those seven-on-seven drills in 2001 has had quite a ride.
Mark Blaudschun can be reached at blaudschun@globe.com.
