by Richard Skinner, Enquirer contributor Ryle assistant coach thrives despite paralysis
Back in July, during the first week of practice for the Ryle football team, senior linebacker Mac Vollett kept wondering how the guy in the wheelchair was going to help him become a better player.
It didn't take him long to find out.
The guy in the wheelchair was assistant coach Adam Collinsworth, a former standout linebacker at Scott High School and then at Thomas More College who broke two vertebrae in his neck in a diving accident at a friend's pool on Aug. 9, 1998. Collinsworth since has been paralyzed from the neck down.
Collinsworth almost didn't survive the accident, twice going into cardiac arrest and having his heart stop both times. After spending three months in a hospital and being told he would need either a ventilator or oxygen tanks the rest of his life in order to breathe, Collinsworth persevered and became a coach at Thomas More for six years beginning in 1999.
Following a six-year stint as an assistant at Amelia High School in suburban Cincinnati while living with his father and stepmother, he was forced to move into his brother Craig's home in Florence when they became too old to care for him anymore.
That led to a phone call to Ryle coach Bryson Warner asking if he needed any help. "I told him 'absolutely,' and we'll create a position for you if we have to," said Warner. "I've known him since he was at Thomas More, and I knew how good of a coach he is."
Defensive coordinator Mike Woolf also coached the linebackers, but after spending a few days with Collinsworth, he knew it was time to turn over the reins coaching that position. "He said, 'Hey, he really knows his stuff and we have to make him our linebackers coach,' " said Warner. "It was a no-brainer."
That didn't keep Vollett and his position mates from wondering how Collinsworth could coach them from a wheelchair.
"I'm not going to lie - that first week I wasn't sure how that was going to work," Vollett said. "But after the first week, we all picked up on what he was teaching and we knew he knew what he was talking about. He's probably the strongest guy mentally I've ever met. We all look up to him."
Before Collinsworth was injured, he had planned on getting a teaching degree and becoming a coach. While he hopes to still eventually become a full-time teacher - he's hoping to become a substitute at Ryle soon - he says the coaching part helps him persevere.
"Without football I don't know what I would do," Collinsworth said. "I wasn't sure if I could find a job or not after the accident and it's been hard, but I love coaching and it has me excited to wake up every day."
On Friday nights he's usually in the press box to provide another set of eyes for Woolf and the rest of the coaching staff, although he is occasionally on the sideline depending on the press box arrangements. "I got trampled once when I was at Thomas More when I was too close, and I've tried to learn to stay out of the way, but I love seeing the action," said Collinsworth.
Collinsworth's mere presence is a constant source of inspiration for the Raiders.
"I kind of try to play for him," said Vollett. "He had football taken away from him and a lot of people could have given up. I've never seen him give up. I'm not about to do it either."
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