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When Crossan was coming out of high school in Long Island, colleges lined up to land him as a lacrosse player. He whittled the list down to two — Notre Dame and Michigan — before choosing New Hampshire as his destination, as a football player.

“The analogy I always use is Long Island lacrosse is kind of like Texas football in terms of being a big deal,” said Crossan. “It’s the big thing around town so I was in lacrosse from a very young age. I went through the recruiting process in both sports, but I always knew my heart was in football and I wanted to be a football player. I kind of entertained the recruiting process just because of the caliber of schools that were recruiting me for lacrosse, but I always knew it was going to be football. I loved football and I didn’t love lacrosse. A Division 1 sport in NCAA is kind of like a full-time job, you’re doing it year round. I couldn’t see myself doing that with lacrosse.”

Crossan had a difficult decision to make earlier this year. He was being pursued by the Orlando Apollos of the Alliance of American Football (which wound up suspending operations in early April). But he’d also heard from the Redblacks.

“The Alliance was an opportunity, then there was this,” said Crossan. “I was pretty healthy at that point, it was more that this was a better opportunity. Playing in the Alliance would have been a lot of football —if you play there, then come here or go back to the NFL, it’s kind of 12 straight months with no breaks for your body. Considering the stuff I’d been through, I didn’t know if that was the best idea for me. I wound up just saying ‘I’m not going to be play in the Alliance, I’m going to keep getting healthy and stronger and be ready to go.’ So I signed the contract to come up here and play.”