Prior to the kickoff of the Duke-North Carolina football game Nov. 20, parents of seniors joined their sons on the field for the annual Senior Day ceremony. At the end of the line stood Richard and Diane Harris, parents of the late Micah Harris, who passed away this summer in a tragic car accident.
As the PA Announcer read Micah Harris’ name, his former teammates huddled around the Harris’ in a circle of what his mother said has become her extended family.
“When they gave the announcement that Micah had passed away in June, it was another closure to a chapter with him and his years at Duke,” Diane Harris said of her son, who would have been celebrating Senior Day with his classmates. “When the players joined us and left their own parents and own families to come and stand in Micah’s place, it was almost more than we could endure because we know how much he loved them.”
Harris was killed June 11 when his 1989 Volvo struck a tree in Brunswick County, Va. The 21-year old was driving to visit his girlfriend when he apparently fell asleep at the wheel.
The following days were traumatic for everyone who knew Harris, especially his teammates, coaches and others who were involved with the Duke football program. And they flocked to his memorial service in his hometown of Poland, Ohio.
At the time, Harris’ closest friends on the team insisted on finding ways to commemorate Harris. Throughout the season, the players have paid tribute to their friend and teammate in a variety of ways. Several have gotten tattoos to remember Harris, while others have carried around two nickels, symbolic of the lineman’s number 55. And just as his parents held his place on the field on Senior Day, his teammates preserved his locker, turning it into makeshift memorial.
“We have his locker, we kept it intact, and we always dress it up for Game Day and put his jersey in there. We have pictures in there and flowers and cards,” former roommate Chris Dapolito said. “Anytime you just want to do a little something special, you want to write another note, just throw it in his locker, another picture, it’s always open for us to go and do that.”
The team also reserved a locker for Harris on the road, and the Blue Devils continue to cope by keeping as many reminders of the lineman with them, head coach Ted Roof said.
The players and coaches continuously share stories about Harris with his parents during phone conversations and visits, helping them to better understand the type of person their son was during his time at Duke. His teammates remember his contagious laughter and how he was never afraid to tell his friends that he loved them.
“Anytime I think of Micah, I always remember him smiling, having a good time and one of the biggest things is he loved to be around all of us,” Dapolito said. “He didn’t want to be alone, he loved to be around all of us to hang out. He’d put aside anything, school work or whatever, just to hang around with the guys.”
Echoing sentiments of his former teammate’s other close friends, senior Giuseppe Aguanno described Harris’ parents as “two of the greatest people we’ve ever met,” and the feeling is mutual.
“The way I look at it is I lost a son, but I’ve gain so many others, so many more sons, because of how they’ve intertwined their life with Micah’s,” Harris’ mother said. “For us it was very touching, a tribute to them.”
This crop of seniors will leave Durham without ever forgetting their classmate, teammate and most importantly their friend, and Duke will never forget Harris either.
“[Roof] has said many times to us, ‘you are always part of our family,’” Diane Harris said. “It has not ended because Micah is not here to play his senior season and is not here to graduate. He will always be a part of that institution.”
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