INGLEWOOD, Calif. — Toward the end of a 20-hour odyssey, once they had crossed into Texas all the way from Darnestown, Md., Brian and Johnny Hodges came upon a bridge.
“Johnny, I didn’t know there was any water in Texas,” Brian recalled telling his son Sunday afternoon, the day before Johnny will complete his improbable journey by starting at linebacker for TCU in the national title game against Georgia. “We were so ignorant about Texas. We didn’t know anything about Texas.”
Johnny Hodges, now a junior and a key cog in the Horned Frogs’ defense, came to Fort Worth under remarkably improbable circumstances, and the story has gotten more and more impossible since. After his sophomore year at the United States Naval Academy, Hodges was ready to walk away from the football team and move on to life without sports. His dad encouraged him to hit the transfer portal, and when the offers didn’t come, Brian Hodges started writing emails to coaching staffs all over the country.
“Nothing was happening,” Brian told The Post. “Nobody was responding to these emails.”
“It was a dark time in my life for sure,” Johnny Hodges said. “I thought football was over. I thought I was gonna move onto the next chapter of my life without sports. It was a dark, dark time.”
Eventually, though, one reached the TCU staff, where Joe Gillespie had just been hired as the defensive coordinator. Gillespie had been on staff at Tulsa, an AAC team that plays Navy regularly, since 2015 and did not need to be told who Hodges was. Thus came the only offer he needed.
From there, it was a scramble. the younger Hodges got the necessary paperwork to get released from the Naval Academy on a Friday night and had to be at TCU by Sunday afternoon to meet with Gillespie. Father and son got into Johnny’s Toyota 4Runner at 5:30 a.m. Saturday in Darnestown and started driving.
They made a pit stop in Arkansas for the night then got back at it at 8 a.m. the next day.
“We called coach [Gillespie] and said, hey, we’re running a few minutes behind, but we’ll be there,” Brian Hodges said. “He’s like, no worries. We’ll see you when [you] get here.”
They arrived Sunday, Jan. 9; 365 days later, Hodges will step onto the field Monday night at SoFi Stadium and play for a national championship.
“It’s surreal,” he said. “It’s what everyone’s dreamed of their whole life. Every kid who grew up playing football wants to be here on this big stage and get to this level.”
Father, like son, is still trying to get his head around it.
“Man, you couldn’t have things line up any better than this, ever,” Brian Hodges said. “And you know what, they’ve kept on lining up. Here we are, the national championship tomorrow. I mean, it’s just remarkable. I’m speechless over it. It’s amazing.”