The ambulance pulled away from the football field, up the cement path and off the Westfield High premises. As it left, the fans who had gathered to watch the Bulldogs take on Freedom-Woodbridge in the 2018 Virginia Class 6 semifinals slowly turned their attention back to the field, where play was resuming in a game that now felt altered and strange.
Inside the ambulance, Westfield quarterback Noah Kim asked his mother to pass him his phone.
A two-year starter, the junior was the appointed custodian of everything that had been built by the Westfield program. The 37-game winning streak. The three consecutive state titles. The legacy of poise and domination. Coach Kyle Simmons had been known to tell people, including Kim, that the Bulldogs won or lost because of Noah Kim.
But on the cold and drizzly afternoon of Dec. 1, all the quarterback could do was pull up a live stream and watch his team’s season end as the ambulance made its way to the hospital.
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“It wasn’t until a couple of weeks later, when the time was right, that people came up to me and said, ‘You know that was your first-ever loss?’ ” Kim said.
Nine months later, Kim is back for his senior season and prepared to pilot Westfield (1-0) back to the playoffs, this time, he hopes, with a much different ending.
The injury was sudden and gruesome. Simmons described it as the worst he has seen in his nearly 20 years coaching at Westfield. Kim met serious pressure on a second quarter pass attempt and decided to take the sack. He tried to go down without absorbing a hit, but the play ended in a dogpile. In the mess of bodies, his leg was caught underneath him.
As his tacklers and teammates made their way back to the line of scrimmage, Kim lay still on the frozen ground. He had broken his femur.
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“I just saw him pounding the ground with his fist,” senior wide receiver Eli Soto said. “And then I saw all my teammates coming off the field, some of them crying. They couldn’t believe what they saw.
“I mean, it’s Noah Kim. The star quarterback, the state champion that went undefeated as a sophomore. Just to see him go down brought our whole team down.”
Kim said he was never given a timetable for his recovery. Doctors simply told him to take it one step at a time, and if all went well, he should be able to return for his senior season. But that was months away.
He had been an athlete all his life, always moving from one practice or training session to another. Being immobilized that winter changed his body and altered his mind. He dropped weight throughout December. He felt antsy and restless, constantly eager to plow through a recovery process that couldn’t be rushed.
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“I always wanted to be in the physical therapy room, always wanted to be lifting,” he said of that time. “I just wanted to be back. I wanted to be myself again.”
Kim had registered to take a weightlifting class with Simmons that semester, so he spent a lot of time in his coach’s office. For two months, he would do homework in there alone as his classmates lifted. He felt weaker as they grew stronger.
In the office, Simmons had hung up three pictures. The first was Kim on the ground, right after the hit. The second was Kim being taken away on a stretcher. And the third was an action shot of Kim playing quarterback.
“I wanted him to see that every day when he came into my office because that was the goal: For him to get back to that last picture,” Simmons said.
As winter faded and warmer weather started to arrive, Kim’s recovery turned into a series of milestones. In February, he did light throwing without much use of his legs. In March, he started lifting weights in earnest. By April, he could do real drop-backs. He started to feel like himself again.
Bionic Man. Less than 4 months since broken femur. Better than he was before. Better, Stronger, Faster. Who knows where that reference come from? pic.twitter.com/KRvF8fsQIn
— Kyle Simmons (@WestfieldFB) March 21, 2019By the middle of spring, Kim was able to turn his attention away from the injury and toward his recruitment. He threw for Division I coaches throughout April and took a visit to Virginia Tech, his top choice, in early May. He committed on the spot.
“Everyone who has helped me get to this point, all the coaches and family members, can come and see me play there,” Kim said.
The final milestone came months later — this past Friday night. The No. 6 Bulldogs opened their season with a game against Battlefield, and Kim wanted to prove to his teammates and to himself that he was ready to lead Westfield.
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Westfield began its season with a 51-0 rout of the Bobcats. The quarterback looked and played like himself, and the future of the program again looks bright as the Bulldogs prepare to host Champe on Friday.
Before last week’s win, Kim took the field and headed to the 10-yard line, the spot where he was injured in December. Alone in the swirl of warmups, he went to one knee, returning to that game and to that moment so he could fully move past it.
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