Just walking through the door, Da'Shawn Hand had an instant impact on the high school weight room in northern Virginia.
In town for spring break, Alabama's defensive lineman just wanted a quick workout. From a distance, coach John Harris caught a glimpse of a freshman.
"And his eyes lit up almost like he saw a mythical figure," said Harris, a mentor and former high school coach of Hand's who remembers him at that age.
Back home in the Washington D.C. suburbs, Hand is the returning hero who traveled south following the college football dream. He left that area four years ago as the nation's No.