Hard life in rise of Hokie

On the nights his mother was out working one of her three jobs, Kam Chancellor and his three brothers stayed home in their three-bedroom apartment, where all four bunked in the same room.

There weren't any Tonka trucks or fancy toys around the place to entertain them. Just each other and their imaginations.

Their older sister Krystle, who is seven years older than Kam, babysat the boys and watched them hold competitions to see who could do the most jumping jacks. Or maybe they'd throw a sheet over the kitchen table and duck underneath it into their own magical house. Some nights, they'd rehearse a play and get the routine down pat by the time Mom walked through the door to see Kam, smooth dancer that he was, cutting a rug.

He is the third-youngest of Karen Lambert's six kids, and he long ago got used to happily maximizing his few material possessions.

He is 20 years old now and the starting free safety for Virginia Tech's football team. As the quarterback of the Hokies' defense, he is responsible for lining up his teammates in the correct coverage and ought to play a significant role in the Jan. 1 Orange Bowl against Cincinnati. Within two years, he could be earning an NFL paycheck.

So he can look back with some perspective and realize how much his mom struggled to raise a family on her own in Norfolk's Park Place neighborhood, one of the city's toughest sections.

Despite her frantic work schedule -- which included driving a city bus and a trolley, and working the overnight shift at the printing press for the local newspaper -- the family had to rely on Section 8 government housing assistance and still does, Chancellor said. He stuffed his face during lunch at school, because he knew food would be limited at home. When he was 10, he got a job sweeping the floor at a local barbershop run by a family friend. He put the money toward school clothes for himself and his brothers.

Chancellor wants to eventually use his athletic talent -- and with a 6-3, 225-pound body, he has a considerable amount -- to further support his family, which, while still living modestly, certainly isn't penniless. His mom moved into a house in Park Place about five years ago. She now works just two jobs: delivering auto parts and manning the ticket booth at a mall parking garage. Kam got the iPod he wanted for Christmas.

But his goal remains: "Hopefully have my mom not working one day," he said. "Let her chill sometimes."

Despite his underwhelming performance this season, he submitted his paperwork to the NFL committee that advises underclassmen on where they might be selected in next spring's draft. He said he's curious about where he stands and is "90 percent" sure he'll return to Tech.

He figures he'll be a strong safety in the NFL. A quarterback in high school, he excelled last season while playing rover, a position on Tech's defense that is similar to strong safety. But he moved to free safety this season and has missed badly on several open-field tackles.

Before the season, Tech defensive backs coach Torrian Gray told Chancellor he could be the best safety to ever play for the Hokies -- lofty praise considering Gray is a former Tech safety and second-round NFL draft pick. But Chancellor adjusted slowly to his new role, which required him to cover more of the field. Because of this, he had to take fundamentally sound angles on open-field tackles. He missed several tackles in the season opener against East Carolina.

But Gray is pleased with Chancellor's progress in recent weeks. "He's too good not to come along to where he should be," Gray said. He believed Chancellor would play well enough this season to leave early. But because of Chancellor's struggles -- Gray expected him to have more than one interception by this point -- Gray advised him to stay in school.

One of Chancellor's problems this season was that he too often tried to make a big hit -- something that always came instinctively. In a youth-league game when he was 9, he hit one boy so hard the kid's helmet popped off, and officials had to stop the game to make sure he was OK. Chancellor earned a nickname: Killer Kam.

His life at home wasn't so ideal, as his mom's income went but so far. "There were so many of us that one set of groceries she got, it would be gone in like one or two days," Chancellor said. "All the milk would be gone. It was just hard to get meals, for real. And I'd just try to eat a lot at school."

He bought extra lunch with the money he made from working at Andy's Barber Shop, a few blocks from his home, down by the railroad tracks. He stopped by after school, quietly swept hair off the floor, took out the trash and earned $10 or $15 in tips from each of the shop's eight barbers. He worked there until he entered high school and his sports schedule got hectic.

Chancellor got some of his earliest haircuts at Andy's, and the shop's owner, Kumasi Johnson, became a close family friend. He took Chancellor and his brothers paddle-boating and bowling.

Chancellor's father has never been a part of his life. Chancellor became the man of his mother's home, especially for his brothers: Kyle, now 22; Kreighton, 17; and Keenan, 16. "Their backbone," said Krystle, who is the family's second-oldest child behind Karla, 31.

If Chancellor returns to school, he has the chance to further distinguish himself by becoming the first member of his family to earn a college degree. Johnson believes that will help bring him back to Tech. "He takes everything in steps and phases," Johnson said. "He doesn't shortcut."