![\"\u201cFinding](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Untitled1.png.png\")
LTC Greg Gadson was still recovering, but at home one Monday morning when his cell phone rang. Greg recognized his former West Point football teammate, Mike Sullivan\u2019s number. \u201cSully!\u201d Greg shouted into the phone. In the years since graduation, Sullivan had completed his military commitment and gone on to become a coach for the New York Giants. Sully had visited him at Walter Reed Army Medical Center not long after Greg was wounded in an IED explosion. \u201cHey Greg\u2014how are you doing?\u201d Sully sounded tentative. \u201cGood! I\u2019ve been watching\u2014you really had some bad breaks in the last two games.\u201d The Dallas Cowboys and the Green Bay Packers had left the Giants 0-2.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYeah, we\u2019re struggling,\u201d Sully understated. The team was dragging, physically and emotionally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSo,\u201d Sully hesitated, \u201cI wanted to ask you a favor.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSure, Sully, what is it . . .\u201d . . . that I could do for you in my condition? Greg finished the sentence in his head.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI want you to talk to the team.\u201d \u201cTo the Giants? About what?\u201d he asked. He looked down at his stubs. It had only been four months\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI just want you to tell them your story,\u201d Sully said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Greg went silent for a minute. He had not counted on being anyone\u2019s spiritual role model, especially for a whole team of people, especially one that played in the NFL. He was barely holding himself together, some days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI\u2019ll do it, Sully, yeah, of course.\u201d The confidence in his own voice surprised him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He was a college player. Former college player. Former college player with no legs. What was he going to say to a room full of professionals?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Typically, it was Coach Tom Coughlin who addressed the team the night before game day. But on the evening before the Giants were to take on the Washington Redskins, Sully took the podium.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI\u2019ve brought a friend of mine along tonight,\u201d Sully began, \u201cand I\u2019d like him to say a few words to you guys. His name is Greg Gadson. Lieutenant Colonel Greg Gadson. He played for West Point, and has had an impressive career in the Army. Last spring, he was injured by an explosive device in Iraq. He lost both of his legs. I think now is a good time for you all to hear his story.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Greg wheeled himself to the front of the room. He glanced at the index card he\u2019d brought along to make notes. It was blank.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cLike Sully just said, I was an outside linebacker for Army. When you play for Army\u2014 it\u2019s different from playing for other colleges. You wouldn\u2019t spend much time worrying about going pro\u2014because you\u2019re going in the Army.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He heard a few chuckles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMy unit and I deployed from Fort Riley to Baghdad last February. When you have a command\u2014meaning I was in charge of a couple of hundred soldiers over there\u2014you have a security team, and I was with them, on our way back from a memorial service for two guys who\u2019d paid the ultimate price . . . ” He stopped, as he always did when remembering the fallen. \u201cAnd that\u2019s when our vehicle struck an IED. So, one minute, I\u2019m driving along a paved road in Iraq, thinking about my job, my mission, what I\u2019m going to have for dinner and the next minute, I\u2019m at Walter Reed and\u2014and nearly half my body is gone.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s how fast your life can change,\u201d Greg plowed forward, feeling his words press the air. \u201cIn an instant, everything as you now know it could be over. You could have a career-ending injury and lose your job. Then what happens to your family? It\u2019s over in a second.\u201d No one spoke. They did not even look at each other. Every Giant stared straight ahead at Gadson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s why you need to use every opportunity you have.\u201d He glanced at Sully. \u201cThat\u2019s how you need to play tomorrow. It\u2019s easy to get caught up in other things\u2014the media, the attention. But none of that matters. The only thing that matters is what\u2019s in this room: your teammates. You can do nothing without the guy next to you. Nothing. On May 7, I would have died without the guy next to me. By the time they found me\u2014I\u2019d been thrown a ways from the vehicle\u2014I was barely breathing and I\u2019d lost a lot of blood. First Sergeant Fredrick Johnson started breathing his own breath into me. You know, Johnson is this big fast-talking southern guy\u2014you can barely understand him when he speaks but he is a great man. He saved my life. Because he knew what to do in the heat of battle. He knew that in that moment nothing mattered but his teammate. Johnson and another guy, Eric Brown. Brown was just a kid. Private First Class Brown was our unit\u2019s medic. I\u2019m alive because of their training and their teamwork.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They had to secure the perimeter, to make sure nothing else happened. They had to control that chaos. And they had to save my life. And that\u2019s what they did. They confronted all that adversity with teamwork. They came together. And they were successful.\u201d Greg paused and looked around the room.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat group of soldiers, out there in the desert, started out having no idea what they were capable of,\u201d Greg continued. \u201cThey didn\u2019t know if they could survive the heat, or an enemy attack, or some crazy disease. They didn\u2019t know how to fight in an urban desert. But they learned. They became each other\u2019s lifelines. In the end they saved my life, and formed that important chain, forged those bonds that got them through that night. And they all made it back to base, back to safety. That was their victory.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Greg stopped talking. The room went silent. Then there was a clap. Then another. Every player rose from his seat, smashing huge hands together, the sound echoing through the room like firecrackers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the dining room Coughlin looked around for Gadson. He had presented a tremendously important message about lack of self, and immersion in team. And just when he thought he could not be any more impressed, he caught an image that set him back for a moment. There was Gadson chatting it up with his hardest nut to crack. Coughlin would not call Plaxico Burress impossible, but he was hard to handle. And the coach had sure handled some tough ones. Burress was an all \u201cI\u201d guy. Not the sort who would warm naturally to an \u201coutsider.\u201d The coach may have wondered if the lieutenant colonel would next offer up two fish to feed thousands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some were calling it the Miracle at the Meadowlands. Beginning with the Redskins game, the New York Giants had nearly whiplashed themselves with a turnaround season. Sully knew it was, at least in part, the words of Greg Gadson that had flipped their odds. The week after the Redskins game the Giants easily handled the Philadelphia Eagles 16-3. Then followed nearly weekly victories. The New York Jets, Atlanta Falcons, San Francisco 49ers, Miami Dolphins, Detroit Lions, Chicago Bears and the Buffalo Bills all fell to the team that had nearly gone bust in September. Then the Giants, unbelievably, headed to the playoffs, where they would beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on their home turf. In Dallas, the Giants walked away with a 21-17 victory against the Cowboys. And in one of the coldest games on record in the NFL, they defeated Green Bay Packers in Wisconsin, confirming their invitation to the Super Bowl.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On February 2, 2008, the night before the championship game, Greg wheeled himself, once again, to the front of a hotel conference room without having put a whole lot of thought into exactly what he wanted to say. But he did have a clear message in mind. This team, now on the very brink, needed only to understand its own power and to believe in it. Belief, Greg thought, eliminates all other possibilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It had been eight months since he\u2019d been blown up, that much he was sure of. He had been told he\u2019d nearly died. He\u2019d nearly died more than once. But in all the struggle, it never occurred to him that he really could have died. He believed Private Brown, who first applied the tourniquets in the field, and First Sergeant Fredrick Johnson, who initially resuscitated him, would not let it happen. Nor would Dr. Brad Woods, the surgeon in Baghdad. Even as he was rushed back into surgery by Dr. Donald Gajewski at Walter Reed, putrid fluid oozing from his collapsing artery, he somehow knew death was never on the table. It was not that he knew he would live. He believed he would live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tomorrow, there could be nothing on the table for this team but belief. Greg put on his soldier face\u2014the look of a commander. This was his unit. They were going into battle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was a very different atmosphere on this Super Bowl eve from the one he had wheeled into in September. The men were different. They had grown together, they had learned to watch each other\u2019s backs. They were stronger and more focused. There was a mighty cocoon that encapsulated them now. They were no longer individuals. He hoped he had imparted some of that spirit. He knew he had become part of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Greg had also evolved. He had worked hard physically, just as they had. And he had seen some dark days over the past several months, just as they had. Like soldiers in trenches, they had fought their greatest enemies together. Something close to relief swept the room when he began to speak this time. They saw a man who had for sure been straight up on the edge of death but had grabbed onto life and stuffed it back into his soul. His spirit was not only intact, it was flourishing. Gadson was learning how to turn hardship not only into a lesson, but into success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf I could be anywhere right now,\u201d Greg began, \u201cI\u2019d be in Iraq with my unit, because that\u2019s where I belong. I know that\u2019s not going to happen. But I\u2019m proud and immensely thankful to be here with you all tonight. I\u2019ve come to know you as a group and I can honestly say you have what it takes now to be champions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Greg continued, \u201cI\u2019m going to talk to you about three words I learned in the Army: pride, poise and team. You have pride. You are proud members of the New York Giants, an organization with a lot of history and you are one game away. You\u2019re poised to create an even deeper history of victory tomorrow. You know how you gain poise? You gain poise with practice and training. Poise means you are ready to make that difficult play, catch that impossible pass because you have gone through that motion so many times, you instinctively know what to do. It\u2019s automatic. It\u2019s rote. In the Army, we couldn\u2019t step onto the battlefield knowing what lies ahead without the unwavering confidence that comes with hard core training and repetition, hammering through those drills every day\u2014that\u2019s poise. And team. You already know about team. I told you in September, there will only be one 2007 New York Giants team and gentlemen, this is it. This is the team that will sustain you for the rest of your lives. This is a team that I\u2019d take back to Iraq with me\u2014every one of you if I could\u2014that\u2019s how strongly I believe in you and your commitment, your bond, to each other. I trust you because you trust each other.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A few players looked at each other, cementing that bond in their glances, nodding in slow motion at his words.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNow there\u2019s one more word I\u2019m adding, and that\u2019s belief. Most importantly, you have to believe. Believing is better than knowing. It\u2019s that powerful. When I was lying down in the desert, weak, bleeding, unable to call out, wondering when my soldiers would come, even then I believed I would live. Dying wasn\u2019t an option. And here I am talking to you right now. Because I believed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n From \u201c<\/i>Finding Waypoints: A Warrior\u2019s Journey Towards Peace and Purpose<\/i><\/a>\u201d by Terese Schlachter and Col. Gregory D. Gadson, (Ret.). Copyright \u00a92023 and reprinted by permission of Schaffner Press, Inc.<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n\n Terese Schlachter is a Washington-D.C. based writer and producer of videos and documentaries (NBC News, Dept of Defense) who first met Col. Gadson when covering the new veterans facility at the former Walter Reed Army Medical Center in 2007.<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n\n Col. Gregory D. Gadson retired from the Army and is an independent government contractor. He serves on several boards (among them the Gary Sinise Foundation, Hope for Warriors, and World Team Sports), and travels the country giving inspirational talks to corporate groups, non-profits, people with disabilities, teams, and other organizations.<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n\n This article is an Op-Ed and as such, the opinions expressed are those of the author.<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n\n If you would like to submit a letter to the editor, or submit an editorial of your own, please email <\/i>opinions@militarytimes.com<\/i><\/a> for Military Times or our services sites.<\/i> Please email <\/i>opinion@defensenews.com<\/i><\/a> to reach <\/i>Defense News<\/i><\/a>, <\/i>C4ISRNet <\/i><\/a>or <\/i>Federal Times<\/i><\/a>.<\/i> Want more perspectives like this sent straight to you? <\/i>Subscribe to get our Commentary & Opinion newsletter<\/i><\/a> once a week.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In this excerpt from \u201cFinding Waypoints,\u201d retired Army Col. Greg Gadson remembers his motivational locker room speeches to the New York Giants.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":108541,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":18,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[75,101,24,26,18],"tags":[],"coauthors":[7106,7108],"class_list":["post-75681","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","category-daily-news-roundup","category-home","category-newsletters","category-opinion"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"MCVDPDKD5NGR7JASF6NXTEFKRQ","arc_canonical_url":"\/opinion\/2023\/11\/03\/how-an-army-officer-inspired-giants-to-greatest-ever-super-bowl-upset\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n![\"Greg](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/3-Army_Def_.jpg.jpg\")
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![\"Terese](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Finding-Waypoints-Gadson-Schlachter-photo-cr-Jonathan-Thorpe.jpg.jpg\")
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