Sept. 15, 2005
Hero. It's a word that gets thrown around a lot. A heroic effort; a hero's welcome; but talk to senior defensive lineman Zach Kauflin for five minutes and you'll find out what being a hero is all about.
After a successful football career at Farmington High School, several smaller schools offered Kauflin the chance to continue playing the game. He appreciated the acknowledgement of his accomplishments, but the chance to walk-on to the football team at Mizzou was an opportunity he couldn't pass up.
"I just thought that as long as I'm [going to keep playing] I might as well go play with the big boys," Kauflin said.
Although he has yet to play with the "big boys" during a regular season game, Kauflin has been an invaluable part of the defensive scout team. In 2002, he was named defensive scout team player of the week twice and in 2003 he was named defensive scout team MVP in preparation for the game against Kansas. To Kauflin, playing football for Mizzou isn't about basking in the spotlight. It's about working hard and having fun.
"If I can give it my all every time, I've made the team better," he said. "I just go out there to earn respect from my family and friends at home, my friends here, my coaches and my teammates. I feel that I've gone out and done that."
If his dedication to helping his team prepare for game-time each week hasn't garnered him enough respect from family and friends, his resilience in the face of adversity certainly has. Since his days as a redshirt freshman in 2001, Kauflin has endured two torn ACLs and a stress fracture in his foot. He has also survived a bout with Burkitt's Lymphoma--a rare and aggressive form of cancer.
During finals week of the spring 2004 semester, Kauflin was working out in front of a mirror when he noticed a strange lump on his neck. He dismissed the lump as a swollen lymph node, but when he still noticed the lump a week and a half later, Kauflin decided to have it checked out. A biopsy was scheduled for June 16, 2004; two days later he was diagnosed with cancer. By the end of the following week, Kauflin was at St. Louis' Barnes Jewish Hospital under the care of Dr. John DiPersio, a leader in the field of stem cell transplantation. Tubes were inserted into Kaufin's chest in preparation for the aggressive chemotherapy treatment he would receive. Despite the severity of his illness, Kauflin remained calm and focused.
"I approached this as I would approach any other task in my life," he said. "I've got this problem and it's not going to stop me. I'm going to attack it full-force. I knew I could handle it."
Kauflin may have known that he could handle it, but the nurses weren't initially so sure. Due to the highly lethal chemotherapy drugs that were injected into his system, Kauflin says that the nurses expected him to be immobilized in his bed by the end of the week. Instead, the nurses walked into his room on Friday morning to find Kauflin on the floor--doing push-ups.
"I told my nurse coordinator, `I'm going to be unlike any other cancer patient that you've ever had' and she just laughed," he said. "Go ask her now and she'd say, `yeah, he was different."
In addition to push-ups, Kauflin tried to stay physically fit by riding the hospital's stationary bike and walking laps in the hallways. When he wasn't working out, he would be socializing at the nurses' station or doing his homework on the computer. After all, Kauflin was still a full-time student at Mizzou.
Kauflin was in the midst of a seven-week chemotherapy treatment at Barnes when the fall 2004 semester began. He arranged his schedule so that he could attend his Chemical Quantitative Analysis, Physics and Accounting classes in Columbia on Monday and Tuesday; drive to St. Louis and begin chemotherapy treatment early Wednesday morning; finish the chemotherapy treatment early the next Monday morning; and drive back to Columbia in time to attend class. While in Columbia, Kauflin also continued to attend football practice and cheer on his teammates.
October 31, 2004, was Kauflin's last day of chemotherapy. He began practicing with the team just two weeks later. He no longer had to endure a grueling commuting schedule but began balancing local radiation treatments on his brain with school work and football practice. Kauflin says that the radiation treatment didn't affect him much on the gridiron, but it did take a toll on his short-term memory.
"Mentally I lost eight months of my life," he said.
Kauflin is now in remission, has been awarded a football scholarship, and is number four on the depth chart at defensive end for the 2005 season. To Kauflin, a successful season doesn't require achieving a perfect record. Instead, he believes that success is defined by the players' commitment to the team and accountability for their actions.
After graduation, Kauflin, a chemistry major, hopes to find personal success in pharmaceutical sales, preferably in the department of oncology. He is determined to keep moving forward and attacking new challenges as they come his way, but is quick to acknowledge all of the doctors, nurses and teachers who have helped him over the past year. He also credits his recovery to the support of his family and girlfriend, Melissa Durant. However, if there is one person Kauflin believes has influenced and motivated him the most, it would be his older brother Vince.
"Any successes I've had in my life are because of him," he said. "That's where my attitude came from about life."
That tenacious attitude is evident not only in the way he has overcome the adversity in his life, but also in the way that he fondly looks back at his time as a Missouri Tiger.
"I wouldn't have had it any other way."
-Written by Emily Allen, Missouri Media Relations Student Assistant