WEST LONG BRANCH, N.J. - Members of the Monmouth University football team had a once in a lifetime opportunity in February to train under the guidance of Raymond C. Smith, the former commander of the elite forces of the United States Navy's Sea, Air, and Land Teams, more familiarly known as the Navy "SEALs. "

Smith, a Vietnam veteran who rose to the rank of rear admiral in the United States Navy, has a resume that reads like the script of a blockbuster Hollywood movie.  After joining the Navy as an enlisted man, Smith won an unusual appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy in one year. After serving two years on a destroyer, Smith volunteered to serve in the SEAL program.

During his service as a SEAL, Smith earned a Bronze Star and Navy Commendation Medal for his combat efforts. Smith graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy with a degree in Physical Oceanography, and then served as operations officer and executive officer of SEAL Team 12.

His outstanding efforts over a distinguished military career eventually led to his appointment as director of the U.S. Navy SEAL training program, which is generally considered to be the most challenging military training in the world.

During his tenure, Smith led a staff of instructors that obtained the highest graduation rate in the history of the unit.

Smith's accomplishments weren't just administrative. During Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm he led 350 Seals and support personnel in 270 successful special operations combat missions without a single fatality. Smith eventually earned the rank of rear admiral, as the commander of SEAL operations, serving in the position for four years-the longest tenure in U.S. Navy history.

How did the storied veteran wind up as the temporary training coach of the Monmouth University football team? 

It started when Monmouth University Head Football Coach Kevin Callahan wanted to bring in a motivational speaker to work with his team.  Callahan spoke with Marilyn McNeil, Vice President and Director of Athletics, who escalated the request to Monmouth University President Paul Gaffney. 

Gaffney, who is a former Vice Admiral in the United States Navy, immediately thought of Ray Smith, a personal and professional friend of more than 40 years.  The Admirals Gaffney and Smith started as midshipmen and teammates on the track and field team at the U.S. Naval Academy.

Smith recalled that Gaffney "was a year behind me, but on the track and field team and we got to know each other."   

"We have maintained our friendship over the past 44 years," Smith said.

"President Gaffney offered me the opportunity to come to Monmouth to speak to the football team," Smith said. "We took that initial idea and expanded our time together to not only speaking, but doing some things that I thought would help out the football team."

Smith said that there are a lot of mental and physical similarities between SEAL training and being a successful member of a football team.

The retired SEAL Commander spent three days in February working with members of the team, breaking them up by positions and setting up a number of competitions. Players were paired together and were put through a rigorous workout, while being forced to memorize details about items and situations.  

 "That is one of the standing traits of the SEALs," Smith said. "We have certain games that we use to help them get better at thinking during physical stress."

While members of the team were undergoing the physical training, they were also forced to memorize certain items and pass them to their teammate. At the end of the session each teammate had to write them all down.

"In the Navy SEALs and in football, you not only have to work hard, you have to think hard," Smith said.

Rising freshman running back Kevin Rogers (Ocean, N.J./Ocean Twp.) understood the importance of keeping your wits and mind sharp in stressful situations while paying attention to details.

"I think the way I looked at it, how I approached it, is that it is all about smarts," Rogers said.

"I had the opportunity, and really the privilege, to work with the entire football team," Smith said. "I broke the team into four groups, and they competed amongst themselves and the four groups, and it involved doing a very strenuous physical training session that I led myself."

"It sounds very simple," Smith said.  "But simple tasks become difficult when you are doing a lot of hard work. That's what makes SEALs the predominant fighting force. That's also what football players have to do. They're under high stress; they're working very hard physically, but they can never, ever, stop thinking, and that's what this thing is all about."

The physical and mental exercises that Smith put the team through emphasized the ability to communicate, to work as a team, and to focus on a long-term goal and not get distracted by immediate interruptions.

"You can be a good athlete; you can be strong; you can be fast; you can have all these different attributes, but I think intelligence is one of the biggest things that people overlook," Rogers said.

While the physical exercises were modeled after the Navy SEALs training, it was just a small fraction of what the SEALs actually endure.

"He told us that we basically did a portion of what a real Navy SEAL does, and I was hurting at some points," said Rogers. "Some of the neck exercises they do, the abdominal workouts they do; it's pretty hard and we only did a little part, I can't imagine what they have to deal with."

"Admiral Smith taught us a lot of lessons about working together and trying to be a unit," said senior tight end Tyler George (Berkeley Heights, N.J./Governor Livingston). "A lot of the core principles that the SEALs train and teach relate to the football field," George said.

"I think the communication that we needed during the drill and the test will help us understand that that is important while playing. Hopefully we'll take this small example and really utilize that in the season," George said.

Head Football Coach Kevin Callahan said, "Admiral Smith showed us how the SEAL training is similar to the training that a football team goes through."

"Cooperation, teamwork, communication, perseverance, the ability to be able to focus on a single task when there's a lot going on around you-these are things that are not only important to Navy SEALs: it's something that football players have to do," Callahan said.

"The team members did some classroom work; they did some physical training, and I think they came out with a greater appreciation of not only what Navy SEALs actually do, but how that relates to them as football players and how they can use those same traits to make themselves better as football players."

Although members of the coaching staff were not permitted to watch the drills or sit in the post-workout meetings with Smith, the coaching staff did learn a great deal about the team and their players during the three-day workout under the former SEAL commander.

"After talking with Admiral Smith and hearing the end of program results, we learned which players performed best as they were directed and who really performed as a team player," Callahan said.

On his final day of training, Admiral Smith brought the entire team and coaching staff together to review the results.  Smith announced the five pairs of players who scored the best along with some highlights from the rigorous workouts.

Members of the offensive line were consistently praised for their astuteness-something that wasn't lost on senior tackle Mike Murphy (Toms River, N.J./Toms River East).

"I think people underestimate how smart we [the offensive line] are, but we need to know a lot of information and we have a bunch of intelligent guys on the line," said Murphy. "I think the whole experience was awesome; it was good for a sense of coming together as a team and leadership. I think it is really going to mature our team."

"It is all about teamwork," said President Gaffney. "It's something we both learned the first day at the Naval Academy. You've got to rely on your roommate and teammate to get through the rigorous environment there," Gaffney said.

Gaffney praised Smith for helping to foster that same mentality among members of the Monmouth University football team.

"Admiral Smith carried that lesson and mentality through his career and talked about it today," Gaffney said.

"I think that's going to be so important for our guys-that you rely on each other, that you have a responsibility for the guy next you, and for the guy behind you," Gaffney said. "I think that is a great lesson in life, and it is going to help our football team immediately."

"So the team started out and they weren't quite sure what the deal was with all of this, but it turned out that they understood very quickly," said Smith.

"I told the student-athletes on the last day that they did as well in the mental challenge as our young SEALs do when they come out of SEAL training. The training we did was not at the level that the SEALs have, but I'll tell you what, it was tough. I watched these guys, and their product was very, very good. All in all, I totally enjoyed my experience here. It was the first time I've done anything like this with a college team.  I really hoped that I have touched these young men and it helps them not only in football but in their lives."

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