Ryan Dunleavy

Staff writer

Keith Hamilton didn’t like the tone of his son’s voice, so the worried father and former NFL star pulled his car over to the side of the road to brace for the kind of news that would have devastated Rutgers football fans.

Was Darius Hamilton — the five-star recruit who stayed home to play for Rutgers — unhappy after a total overhaul of the coaching staff entering his final season?

“He said: ‘Dad, I’ve got to get something off my chest. I’ve got to tell you something,’ ” Keith recalled.

“Then he said: ‘I couldn’t be more excited about these coaches. I feel like I’m learning so much.’ He was playing a trick on me for about five seconds, but I was like, ‘Wow.’ It got me back to that football mode. I had tears in my eyes when he was talking.”

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New coach Chris Ash’s arrival at Rutgers has been portrayed as the dawn of a new era for the program — all early-morning boot camps, revamped player diets and winning pedigrees.

Sitting inside an empty High Point Solutions Stadium wearing a black 2014 Quick Lane Bowl sweatshirt one recent morning, Darius Hamilton explained to Gannett New Jersey that the sense of change is very real — and wholly embraced.

MORE:What are Chris Ash's plans for Rutgers?

“They are demanding us to be great by any means necessary,” Hamilton said. “It’s really bringing out the best in us as players. It’s a really exciting environment to be around right now.

“People will say it’s a coaching change and anybody would be excited the first couple weeks, but I think this is a trend that is going to stay around for a long time. Kids are excited to compete.”

Hamilton missed 11 of 12 games last season due to a knee injury, thus earning a redshirt that afforded the former All-Big Ten defensive tackle the option to be a high-demand immediately eligible graduate transfer in 2016.

“Last year was not the way we wanted to end it, not the way I wanted to end it on an individual note,” Hamilton said, “so there was no shot of me leaving. I love the guys.”

Still stinging with disappointment from the way 2015 played out — his injury, the team’s 4-8 record and the string of off-field incidents involving teammates that contributed to coach Kyle Flood’s firing — Hamilton was one of the first players through Ash’s new office.

MORE: Darius Hamilton on Rutgers: This is where I want to be

“He told me that, as a guy who’s played a lot of football, he is going to need me to be somebody who demanded the best out of his players and wasn’t going to tolerate any kind of nonsense,” Hamilton said.

“I think that was a great message. After talking to him, I just felt really good about the things he wanted us to accomplish and the things he wanted us to buy into."

Ash, who noticed Hamilton’s explosiveness on game tapes whenever he came across Rutgers in his preparations as Ohio State’s defensive coordinator, knew he had identified his preferred type of player.

“He wants to be a sponge and learn what it takes to be a great football player,” Ash told Gannett New Jersey. “He is willing to make the sacrifices to do what we’re asking him to do. My first impression was this is a real serious, committed guy, and I liked him.”

Loaf board

Healthy enough to participate in the grueling offseason workouts “and chomping at the bit to play ball,” Hamilton already has adopted the role of go-between. He expects to be back on the field — possibly in a precautionary limited capacity — during spring practice.

One of the messages the likely-to-be three-time captain is spreading around the weight room is that the workouts — led by taskmaster strength and conditioning coach Kenny Parker — are a form of character-building, not a form of punishment.

“If there is a player who needs to be talked to — especially on the defensive side of the ball — who do you think I go to?” Ash said.

“I’m going to Darius and saying, ‘I need your help.’ He says, ‘I’ve got you, coach,’ and he gets it done. I really appreciate that. Not everybody is willing to do that so quickly with a new coaching staff they don’t necessarily know, and he’s done that for us.”

MORE: Booster donates $1.25M for Rutgers strength and conditioning program

The transition has been made smoother by the willingness — even eagerness — of the relatively young coaching and support staffs to get their hands dirty.

“We are doing tug-of-war against the coaches, with the coaches,” Hamilton said. “They are in your face supporting you, pushing you when you need to be pushed, tough love when you need it. It’s great to have all these people rally around you without even really knowing you.”

The fastest way to be known isn’t a good thing.

The “Loaf Board” is a running tally of every time a player doesn’t give full effort — “loafs it” — by not running two yards through the finish line during a drill.

“Everything here is on display,” Hamilton said. “They chart your attitude and your effort. You get a loaf when you don’t go plus-two. The Loaf Board is posted downstairs in the Hale Center, and everybody can see it. It lets you know what kind of person you are choosing to be.

“It’s numbers of have how many times you loafed on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and so on. The last thing you want is a high total.”

MORE: How much has Rutgers spent on weight room?

That’s not to be confused with a loaf of bread, which is harder to find in the Hale Center now that there are nutritional snacks available to the players around the clock — just like at Ohio State.

“You’ve got your cereal, your fruits, your vegetables,” Hamilton said. “They are really changing things around here."

Digging out of a hole

As the first class of seniors in the Ash era, Hamilton said he and his close friends such as Julian Pinnix-Odrick, Derrick Nelson and Vance Matthews understand their place in history.

Ash has a meticulous long-term vision for building Rutgers into a power.

The once-heralded 2012 recruiting class — most of which was assembled by Greg Schiano — feels more urgency.

“Not that it ever was a burden,” Hamilton said, “but we are looking at this as we owe it to a lot of people to get this done. We owe it to ourselves to get it done.”

How do those two perspectives mesh without butting heads?

“From the moment he walked in the door, he looked at every one of us and told us that he believed in us,” Hamilton said of Ash. “I think that went a long way with the guys.”

MORE: Darius Hamilton a crazed One Direction fan

Knowingly or not, on his first day on the job, Ash — who subscribes to the theory that players who want to succeed want discipline — walked into a room where team leaders already had decided to accept responsibility for the way things had flown off the rails.

Rutgers only has had one transfer since Ash’s hiring. Seven players were dismissed last season.

“We didn’t get it done last year,” Hamilton said. “We put ourselves in the position we were in, and it was time to dig ourselves out of the hole. Whatever happened, we were ready to meet it head on.”

As a result, Ash’s culture change has been received more like a pat on the back than a slap in the face.

MORE: How would Chris Ash solve recruiting decommitment epidemic?

“Firm but fair” is the way Hamilton described the new staff to his father.

“As a coach, you can come into a new job and try to feel your way through things when you don’t know people,” Hamilton said, “but he came in here with his set of rules and the way he wanted to do things. He told us that he’s here because he sees potential in us as players.”

Editors Note: This is Part One of a three-part series of articles over the next few days about Darius Hamilton's comeback.

Staff Writer Ryan Dunleavy: rdunleavy@gannettnj.com