If not for a bit of bravado by an assistant coach at Delray Beach, Fla.'s Atlantic Community HS, the Hokies might have never noticed Dadi Nicolas and Luther Maddy.

The notion might seem unthinkable to Hokies fans as the pair enter their final fall camp today as preseason first-team All-ACC picks, yet Tech's staff came painfully close to missing out on two of the most prolific defensive linemen to ever step on the field in Blacksburg.

It just took a little bragging to catch the Hokies' attention when they stopped by the South Florida school to watch a completely different player practice.

Chris Bean, Atlantic's head coach while Maddy and Nicolas were in high school, says Frank Beamer and defensive line coach Charley Wiles came down to see Atlantic safety Ronald Zamort late in 2010, when they were ambushed by Kelcey Brooks, the school's enthusiastic DL coach.

"Coach Brooks came up to them, Coach Wiles and Coach Beamer, and Brooks said 'I've got two guys who are better than who y'all already have,'" Bean said. "Coach Brooks kept on saying 'we've got two guys that could probably play for you right now', which is a bold statement, and I guess it called some attention to Coach Wiles and Coach Beamer and I said, 'I've got two highlight films ready right now.'"

Had this come from a coach at any other school, Wiles and Beamer might've quickly written off that boast as just bluster from the average high school coach.

Yet by that point, the Hokies had gotten to know Brooks and Bean over the better part of a decade. Brooks had even just spent time with the Hokies, stopping by to see Atlantic alum CB Jayron Hosley as the team practiced ahead of the 2011 Orange Bowl.

Wiles says his relationship with Bean was first kindled when he helped the Hokies recruit receiver David Clowney back in 2002, and he trusted the staff at Atlantic.

"You've got to go with guys you trust and guys you know have a really good feel for kids and what kind of people they are," Wiles said. "We evaluate off the video and sometimes in person, but the big thing is knowing the coaches well enough to tell you what kind of kid you're getting on an everyday basis."

Defensive line coach Charley Wiles overlooks spring practice. | Mark Umansky

So while the Hokies ended up taking a pass on Zamort, who eventually signed with Western Michigan, Wiles agreed to take another look at Bean's two Haitian defensive linemen.

The next time Wiles was in South Florida, this time with defensive backs coach Torrian Gray, then-wide receiver coach Kevin Sherman and Beamer in tow for an in-home visit with another receiver in the area, he seized the opportunity to see Nicolas and Maddy in person.

"After we finished our in-home visit, we had some time, and I thought it would be a great idea to get Coach Beamer to go by Atlantic for a basketball game," Wiles said. "We got there and the basketball game, it was just getting ready to let out, and we never got in the building, but it was a great opportunity to meet the principal, see Coach Bean, Coach Brooks and make an appearance over at Atlantic and that's really when we kind of started the process with Dadi and Luther."

Both Nicolas and Maddy remember coming away from their first meeting with Wiles impressed with the man who would one day become their position coach.

"I thought Coach Wiles was cool, he's also from Florida, he's a Floridian, and he's a cool guy," Nicolas said. "He's a great guy, great coach, that was one of the reasons I was able to pick Virginia Tech."

But both Nicolas and Maddy still had a long way to go before ultimately making their college choices. Bean calls the pair's journey "probably one of the strangest paths to get to a school when it comes to recruitment than any other recruit Virginia Tech has ever had."

"People Don't Do This"

Even though it took quite a while for the Hokies to catch on to the defensive linemen, Tech's slow start was hardly just an oversight by the staff. Indeed, barely any college coach was considering Nicolas in the early going because he'd barely been playing football.

Bean says he did a brief stint at as Atlantic's basketball coach in Nicolas' junior year, and he initially thought the athletic teen might catch on on the hardwood.

"He was trying out his junior year, and I was gonna keep him on the team, he didn't play football his junior year, and I was gonna keep him on for basketball for me, and he came back when we did the grades, he came back ineligible," Bean said.

Undeterred, Nicolas decided to come out for football the following spring. Yet while his athletic ability was evident, things didn't quite click for him when he stepped on the field at his chosen position.

"I was always athletic and I had a passion for wide receiver at the time," Nicolas said. "Every time back home around the park with my friends, I'd be catching the ball and making great catches and stuff like that, but every time during practice when I was trying out running routes, I was dropping the ball."

Bean puts it even more bluntly: Nicolas was never going to be a receiver at Atlantic.

"I just took him on Saturdays for skill work, I told him 'you're gonna work on receiver drills, ball drills and get the timing done on routes with the quarterbacks,'" Bean said. "So he came out on Saturdays and he was trying to play wideout and he just didn't look good. Footwork was all over the place, it was just nasty, it was probably the worst piece of art you ever want to see. It was like 'nah, bro, you're not a Rembrandt,' there's no way I'm gonna be able to put you out there and be successful, you just don't have it.' It was too late in the game for him to be successful at that position."

But Nicolas notes he used to play defensive end in "youth league," and Bean says his staff saw his potential to move back to that spot.

"Coach Brooks and my defensive coordinator they both said 'move him, he's athletic, he's long, he has a tremendous motor and he's got good speed, let's move him to d-end,'" Bean said. "So when we put him at d-end, Coach Brooks worked with him on his skills and just honing him in fundamental wise and he was catching on and honing his craft, and eventually he became one of the better d-ends at the end of the spring practice. He had a decent showing in the spring game, so for him, it was a no-brainer."

Once he spent his senior year at the position, Bean says watching Nicolas' film was eye-opening.

"I think the jaw dropping play for me wasn't a sack or anything like that, it was him engaging an offensive tackle, getting around the offensive tackle, putting his hand on the quarterback and the quarterback got the ball off," Bean said. "Just got a fingertip on him, then turned around, and tackled the receiver that caught the ball.

"For me, in all my years of football, and I've been involved in organized football since age nine, I've never seen that. I've never seen a guy come off of a quarterback and make the tackle down the field 20 yards on a receiver that caught a slant before the linebackers and secondary could make the tackle. This is not normal. People don't do this. So as I watched the whole film, the more plays like that were happening over and over again."

That's the exact film that Bean ultimately passed along to the Hokies when they stopped by for that fateful basketball game, and Wiles says he wasn't the only one to come away impressed with the pair's tapes.

"Coach Beamer went back to the office and he looked at those kids really hard and really, really thought that both of them could play, liked both of them, had seen them in person," Wiles said.

"A No-Brainer"

Yet as the Hokies worked to evaluate Nicolas, he acted to secure a spot at a major program by committing to Minnesota in late January over offers from schools like Kansas, Western Michigan and Eastern Illinois.

"It was kind of a no-brainer that Minnesota was kind of the best he could get right then," Bean said.

But despite that decision, the Hokies decided to jump in and offer Nicolas.

"We thought we needed to go on Dadi for sure," Wiles said. "Just the way that Dadi played on video, we thought we could get him bigger and we thought he'd fit really well into what we do and how we do it, so we offered him right away."

Yet Wiles was less sure about Maddy.

"If we had room, we'd love to take Luther too, but that was a numbers crunch and we weren't sure if we were going to have room to take Luther or not as well, although we thought he was a Division I player," Wiles said.

But even with the DT's status uncertain and the DE committed elsewhere, Wiles invited both players up to campus and they ended up making the trip the weekend before Signing Day on January 28.

"Virginia Tech blew my mind, when I came here on my visit and I loved the whole environment," Nicolas said. "I saw the place for myself, it was a laidback town, great atmosphere, involved fans, we're talking about Hokie Nation here and the love they have for us, and I fell in love with the campus. It just blew my mind."

Nicolas says Hosley took the pair under his wing on the visit and made them feel welcome, and Maddy says that played a big role in shaping his impressions of the program.

"I liked the atmosphere, it was like family, and I saw a chance to come in and play early," Maddy said. "And since they'd offered Dadi too, I saw the chance for me and Dadi to go play together. The coaches and players over here, they treated us like family, so I liked the way they do things at Virginia Tech."

Nicolas came away so impressed from the trip that he committed just a few days later, making his pledge the Tuesday before Signing Day.

Bean says that visit, combined with some negative feelings he harbored toward the Golden Gophers' recruitment style, convinced him it was the right move for his DE.

"The one thing it's hard to get in college football is staff stability," Bean said. "A lot of those programs (that offered Nicolas) didn't have that, and the track record and relationship we already had with Tech made it a no-brainer."

Bean notes that Minnesota also frustrated his staff when they refused to even consider offering Maddy. That stood in sharp contrast to the Hokies, who managed to find a spot for him the day before Signing Day.

"We could not offer him until the board kind of shook out," Wiles said. "We had obligated some offers to some guys and it came down really to one linebacker who chose another school and that freed up a scholarship right toward the end of recruiting, and that enabled us to offer Luther as well."

Maddy won't soon forget the moment he learned he had a scholarship from Virginia Tech.

"I remember the day perfectly," Maddy said. "I was at a basketball game and I was walking home, because I stayed right down the street from my high school, and Coach Wiles called me, and said he had the offer right before Signing Day that night."

While Western Michigan had also offered Maddy, he says he didn't waste any time giving Wiles his answer.

"I was like 'yes' and I took it and I'm here now," Maddy said.

Once Nicolas learned that Maddy would soon become a Hokie with him, he felt all the more sure that he'd made the right choice.

"That was a great blessing, an offer coming for Luther, since he's my friend coming from high school, high school teammate, it made it more comfortable to work with," Nicolas said.

Despite the long and winding road Maddy and Nicolas traveled to get to Virginia Tech, Bean calls the process a credit to how the staff recruits.

"The one thing I can say has always made Virginia Tech so special to me as coach is that when you call them, they watch the film," Bean said. "We have a pipeline because Coach Beamer, Coach Wiles and all the other coaches consider what they see on the film instead of going by most recruitments. Like Miami's recruiting them? Oh we're gonna recruit them. Ohio State's recruiting them? We're gonna recruit them. Alabama's recruiting them? We're gonna recruit them. It doesn't work like that, for them it's like, we come down, we're gonna see what coach has, we're gonna make our determination, we're gonna call them back and say yea or nay.

"Luther and Dadi are basically a part of that history of coach watching film, getting a true evaluation of them and considering them for a scholarship. That's what made this whole relationship so special."

"A Blessing in Disguise"

With their recruitment over, the pair arrived on campus eager to make an early impact on the field.

Yet Nicolas' slight frame convinced the staff to redshirt him to give him a year to bulk up and learn Bud Foster's defense.

"I was definitely trying to play and have a role my first year here, but the coaches made a great decision by redshirting me because I came here a little light, I needed to understand the defense more and get stronger," Nicolas said. "For anybody that redshirts, that's an opportunity to take to become whatever player you want to become. (Senior director of athletic performance Jarrett Ferguson) and everybody in the weight room staff did a great job preparing me over the year."

Maddy was a different story. He had considerably more football experience than his counterpart at DE, and he quickly earned a spot in the rotation at defensive tackle.

"When I came in, I showed out in camp, and they liked me, and I beat out a couple of the seniors, and I became the fifth tackle on the roster," Maddy said.

But he wouldn't stay there for long. DT Kwamaine Battle tore his ACL in preseason camp, and the same injury struck Antoine Hopkins in the team's fifth game of the season against Clemson.

"We lost two guys out of our two deep, so we had to go into our depth and both Corey (Marshall) and Luther played as freshmen due to those injuries," Wiles said.

Maddy recalls being a bit overwhelmed by the size of the stage he was playing on at first, but he quickly adjusted to the pressure.

"The first game in Lane Stadium, I was kind of nervous, the stadium was so loud," Maddy said. "As soon as they started playing 'Enter Sandman,' my heart started racing so fast. But it was a great experience."

Maddy attacks down the line of scrimmage. | Ben Weidlich

He made his first start of the season for the team's thrilling win over Miami and never looked back, starting every game through the team's Sugar Bowl appearance.

"I expected myself to be able to play early, so I wasn't too surprised, that's what I expected of myself was to come in and play in and contribute, so when I got the job, I just did what I could," Maddy said.

With a little help from the younger Hopkins, Derrick, who Maddy says "sat me down and taught me the plays and technique," the DT quickly earned the trust of the staff.

"It was a great feeling, a blessing in disguise," Maddy said. "I took that opportunity and ran away with it."

A Late Start

But even with that starting experience, Maddy says things didn't truly click for him until the following spring practice ahead of his sophomore season.

"That spring I won defensive MVP," Maddy said. "That spring, that's when I really knew the plays and the techniques, that's when I was ready to go. That spring of my sophomore year is when I really like I had it under my belt."

Things were a little rockier for Nicolas. In the June ahead of the 2012 season, he was charged with felony grand larceny for an incident involving a stolen bicycle.

Yet he eventually pleaded guilty to a reduced misdemeanor charge of petty larceny the following August, and was reinstated to the team soon after.

Nicolas then got his first chance at playing time, rotating in for some limited snaps on defense, playing in 10 games in total.

"He got started a little late, but he had a solid redshirt freshman year," Wiles said.

Meanwhile, Maddy had a breakout year, finishing with 4.5 sacks and 35 total tackles.

Yet he says he still didn't quite reach his full potential that season.

"My sophomore year I had a few injuries, I had an ankle injury my freshman and sophomore year, people don't really know about that," Maddy said. "But I'm the type of guy that will get injured and I like to play with it, I don't like to sit around and sit out, I try to play with it. And my sophomore year wasn't as good as it could've been, but I still had 4.5 sacks."

Patience Pays Off

By Nicolas' redshirt sophomore year, the light finally started to come on for the DE.

"It was just reps, the guy was coming along, seeing himself on video and getting coached, then going back out there and doing it again," Wiles said. "He had ability, obviously, the kid can run and jump and bend in open space and chase the football. He had one speed and that's full speed. He had all these great attributes, it was just time."

Although he started just the one game in 2013, Nicolas finished the year with 32 tackles, seven of those for loss, and four total sacks. Most notably, three of those quarterback takedowns came as he battered then-Pittsburgh quarterback Tom Savage to help Tech throttle the Panthers.

"Around that time you'd see glimpses of me as a player, just taking advantage of the little roles that I had because like anybody sometimes you have to be patient and wait for your time," Nicolas said. "There were great players ahead of me and I had to respect their time and keep on learning until when the coaches decided to put me in then give it all I had."

Who's your Dadi? | Michael Shroyer

Maddy was no slouch that year either. He started every single game for the team, posting a career season with 55 tackles, 13.5 going for a loss, and 6.5 sacks.

Like Nicolas' breakthrough, Wiles credits his performance to the gradual accumulation of knowledge of the position.

"It's just repetition. It's experience. Defensive line play is technique-driven, it's not assignment-driven," Wiles said. "It takes reps and experience, the more you play, the better you're gonna get, generally speaking. The more you're in there, you're gonna learn from trial and error."

A Dream Derailed

For the first time since Maddy and Nicolas got to Virginia Tech, both of the Atlantic alums were poised to spend a full season starting and anchoring the defense in 2014.

While the two got to play side-by-side for the first four games of the season, Maddy's knee troubles ultimately derailed that plan.

"Before I got hurt in the East Carolina game, I was already dealing with some other injuries to my back and my left knee," Maddy said. "Then I got hurt against East Carolina in the first quarter, but I played the rest of that game."

Maddy had managed to tear his right meniscus in the game, but he didn't simply call it quits once that happened. Instead, he toughed it out to play Paul Johnson's unconventional offense, even recording a pair of tackles and a quarterback hit against Georgia Tech.

"Because they run a wild offense, all that chopping and crazy stuff, I decided to try and contribute," Maddy said. "Me being there for awhile, I knew how to play against Georgia Tech, so I just took one for the team and tried to be a team player and play that game, but after that game I had to shut it down."

While Maddy languished on the sidelines after undergoing a pair of procedures on his knee, Nicolas finally started to realize the potential Wiles knew he possessed.

He started every one of the team's 13 games, earning 72 tackles and nine sacks.

"He had a really, really nice third year," Wiles said. "It was a matter of time."

NFL Expectations

After his injury setback, Maddy wasn't ready to depart Blacksburg on such a bitter note. He was able secure a medical hardship waiver to return to school, and quickly set to work rehabbing.

Maddy admits that the process was far from easy, but he credits his faith for helping him push through the pain and learn from the experience.

"It's really taught me patience," Maddy said. "It was truly a sign from God, because that's something I had to work on anyways, and the injury really taught me patience and to let things happen. My injury helped me get closer to God and taught me a lot about patience and helped me grow as a man."

But now that he's on the other side of that grind, he says he feels more ready than ever for his final year.

"I feel really good right now," Maddy said. "Just running with the team, changing directions, it just feels real good. We'll see in camp how it feels with pressure on it, going up against double teams, things like that, but as of now it feels really, really good. I feel really in shape, I've lost a few pounds, I feel lean. I'm in great shape, I feel strong, feel explosive, so I'm ready for a great season."

Wiles agrees with that assessment, and says he never doubted that Maddy had the mental fortitude to make it through the grueling rehab.

"The doctors fixed him up, then Luther went to work and got himself prepared to have a great senior year," Wiles said. "He put the work in. He's a great, self-motivated guy, a self starter, very important that he came back and had a great senior year. He knows there's nothing promised after today, he knows for him to have an opportunity to go to the next level, which is obviously a goal for Luther and Dadi, he had to put the work in and get back and he did."

Those NFL dreams have driven Maddy and Nicolas from the moment they started competing at Atlantic, and both say they're willing to do whatever it takes this year to make them a reality.

"That's something I've been dreaming of since high school, I've always dreamed of going to the NFL, going pro, being able to give back to my family back at home," Maddy said.

It would seem that professional scouts will be willing to give the pair a shot if they can live up to the high expectations they've set with their previous performances. Now the challenge will be playing without crumbling under the weight of those same expectations.

Nicolas says that won't be an issue he encounters this year.

"Those expectations you guys are seeing are not even close to the ones I have for myself," Nicolas said. "I want to be the best, so when I play and I'm out there, I try to be best. It's great to be acknowledged and stuff without a doubt, but my feeling right now is it's my last year and I just want to make it my best one and I'm just trying to prove that I'm the best."

Wiles is no stranger to coaching players with NFL aspirations, and he plans to deliver a simple message to the pair as they try to balance their pro dreams with the demands of the season.

"Don't try to do too much, play your position, play hard, technique, fundamentals, chase the football, and all that stuff will work out," Wiles said. "If you go out there all pressed and trying to do something extra, it ain't gonna happen. So just be who you are, play for Virginia Tech, play for your friends, play with your buddies, have fun, all those things."

Throughout it all, the pair seems confident they'll be able to lean on each other after spending the last few years deepening the friendship first kindled in Delray Beach.

"That's my brother right there, that's my bro," Maddy said. "We're both really driven, we're both really family oriented. With being so alike in so many ways, sometimes we butt heads, so me and him will have a little argument here and there, a little argument, but it'll never last long, then we're back. We're like brothers, we'll push each other, when one of us is down, we'll give each other encouragement or motivation and pick each other up, he's like a brother to me."

Wiles notes the pair have lived together since they got to Tech, and they should have no trouble pushing each other to realizing their lofty NFL goals.

"We're bros for life, we're close for life no matter what, we've overcome a whole lot of things," Nicolas said.

"The Master Plan"

But for all those bold proclamations, for now those pro football dreams are still just one crippling injury away from never coming true. That's why Wiles has consistently stressed the value of leveraging their Virginia Tech educations into something beyond football someday.

"We all know that NFL man, it's set up for 'not for long,' and the average career is very, very short, so that's our thing is preparing them to go out and be successful in real life, giving them the discipline needed for it no matter what you're in," Wiles said. "Hopefully they have a 10 year career apiece and make a lot of money and are good to go, but who knows. There's guys every day who get drafted high, and they get hurt, they can't play, whatever it may be, and they can't play anymore and you've got to go to work. So we've prepared those guys and they've prepared themselves to go have success."

With that tutelage in mind, both Nicolas and Maddy admit they have spent some time envisioning a future after their pro careers wind down, or if they never get started to begin with.

For Nicolas, he could set to work on building that future very soon.

"I'm thinking about possibly going to law school in the offseason," Nicolas said. "I'm definitely going to be a businessman, I'm definitely going to stick around this game for awhile, I think by the time I'm done with this game, I'm gonna be able to build a legacy."

Nicolas has already graduated with a degree in sociology and is currently pursuing one in consumer studies, as he considers one day becoming "Dadi Nicolas, Esq."

Maddy's also already earned his diploma, finishing with a degree in apparel, housing and resources with a concentration in residential property, and he's looking to add a consumer studies degree to his shelf as well.

But he says it's his first chosen major that he hopes to use to kickstart a new career someday.

"I've done three internships leasing apartments, so after football, I plan on leaning on that degree," Maddy said. "I want to own my own management company someday, manage apartment complexes and being able to provide housing to people and give them great service."

But whether he makes a living strapping on football pads or balancing a checkbook, Maddy says his efforts will all be directed toward the same goal.

"One day I want to be able to go back to Haiti and give back," Maddy said.

Nicolas hopes that his business could one day take him in a similar direction.

"I could see myself doing a lot of non-profit stuff for Haiti, I want to help out my country," Nicolas said.

While the pair's native nation doesn't lack for problems to solve, Maddy says they might just be able to make a dent if they put their heads together.

"I could definitely see us going back there together and coming up with the master plan, just giving back and showing love, because it's rough down there in Haiti," Maddy said. "It'd be great go down there someday together, being able to open up schools, provide housing, something of some sort to give back to Haiti, maybe we can do that in a few years."

But that goal feels very far off indeed these days. The Haitian linemen may have a future as humanitarians, but in the meantime, they're eager to put the perfect cap on their Tech careers.

"It's not finished yet, we have one more season left so we still both have great confidence in our ability and you guys are gonna be really excited to see what me and Dadi can do," Maddy said.

It truly has been quite the journey for both players to make it all the way from the sandy shores of Delray Beach to the mountains of Blacksburg, but Nicolas sees just a little bit of road left ahead.

"The show's just getting started," Nicolas said.