Give him a salute

Focusing on the screen on his smartphone, Jaryn Villegas tested vantage points to capture a few photos of Leilehua High School’s football field.

With a flight to New York just hours away, he wanted to preserve the moment at Hugh Yoshida Stadium, a stretch of FieldTurf where he found the fortitude to accomplish a goal that would take him across the country.

Villegas flew out Wednesday night bound for West Point, where he’ll enroll at the United States Military Academy Prep School. No doubt a lengthy travel day, and perhaps emblematic of how far he’d progressed to give himself the opportunity awaiting on the East Coast.

"My original plan was to try to attain some sort of scholarship to go to college," Villegas said. "I didn’t expect to go to such a prestigious school."

A childhood that offered little stability could have sent Villegas down far less productive paths. But when he signed up for football tryouts the summer leading into his freshman year at Leilehua, the program’s structure provided a foundation to build toward a college education.

"It’s been a huge impact to be part of this football program, to have the people I’ve had in my life thus far," Villegas said. "I’m only 17, I know there’s a lot more to come. But the people that have come into my life have been a big blessing."

Villegas’ academic and athletic accomplishments drew interest from Army’s coaching staff late in his junior year. He navigated a rigorous admissions process and signed with Army in March in a ceremony at Fort Shafter, along with Kamehameha-Hawaii’s Shaun Kagawa and Campbell’s Paul-Andrew Rhoden.

Kagawa also left on Wednesday and will join Villegas at the academy’s prep school. Rhoden reported for reception day at West Point earlier this month as part of the Black Knights’ 47-player incoming class.

"I have to take it one day at a time and keep improving and making myself better every day," Villegas said. "There’s a whole lifestyle I have to learn still. I’m going to learn quick up there."

Villegas weathered an often-turbulent upbringing to put together an impressive list of academic and athletic achievements. He and his siblings went through several relocations with various relatives starting when he was 5. He remembers living with his mother when they were evicted during the seventh grade. For a time prior to high school, he stayed in a house in Waialua without electricity.

"There was running water, but no form of electricity, I didn’t have anything like that. It was tough," he said. "I remember hand-washing clothes and hanging them up.

"From there it was a turning point."

He had no background in football when he decided to try out as a freshman. He made the Mules’ JV roster as an offensive lineman that summer, having settled in with his grandparents, Eleuterio and Petra, in Wahiawa.

"They’re all about work, home, family, so I think he got some good examples," said Gina Salvia, Villegas’ aunt and a retired Lt. Colonel in the Army Reserve. Salvia was among the relatives who took in Jaryn, his older brother and sister (Jaysin and Jasmine) and younger sister (Jayde Vellalos) at times in their youth when they needed a place to stay.

"It was a wild life for them, but then they turned it around," she said. "I could never have written a book and this would be the ending."

Villegas, who found himself straying toward trouble at points, hadn’t shed all of his old habits when he joined the football program that freshman year. But "listening to the philosophies and values Coach Nolan (Tokuda) was preaching, inside it made me feel guilty," he said. "He’s telling me we should be doing the right things and I’m still doing the wrong things."

To hear Tokuda tell it, Villegas did little wrong over the remainder of his career at Leilehua.

"(Villegas faced) tough circumstances, but he’s the type of kid he doesn’t blame his circumstances. He makes the best of the situation he has," Tokuda said.

Villegas was elevated to the varsity as a sophomore and started on the offensive line as the Mules advanced to the state tournament semifinals. He earned third-team All-State recognition as a junior and made the OIA Red West first team and All-State second team his senior season.

He took up judo as a sophomore and placed second at the state championships his first two years. He added wrestling to his schedule as a junior and a year later was the state champion in the 285-pound weight class.

The discipline he developed on the field and the mat crossed over into academics. He posted a 3.64 grade-point average and earned a scholarship as a "distinguished recipient" at the HMSA Kaimana Awards luncheon in June.

"From the time he stepped on our campus, he knew education was his ticket," Tokuda said. "He never did the bare minimum, he always does above and beyond. It wouldn’t be ‘just finish the job.’ It was, ‘finish the job right.’ "