I don’t normally pay a whole lot of attention to what college football coaches say. But Nebraska coach Matt Rhule’s remarks last week are worth all of our attention.

Early last week, Dallas Cowboys defensive end Marshawn Kneeland died by suicide. With that tragedy on his mind, Rhule gave an impassioned speech on mental health, where he said:

“Seeing the tragic news out of Dallas today, understand that none of us know what people are going through. That’s why I think we all should be careful about what we say to people. I think we should be careful what we tweet about people. I think we should be cognizant of what everyone’s going through.

“I told our players they should take their headphones off in the cafeteria and sit down with someone and be like, ‘How you doin’, man? What’s going on with you?’

“I will forever, for the rest of my life, think about the time that I saw Adrian Robinson right before he took his own life. I saw him on campus and … I was like, ‘I need to catch up with Adrian.’ And a week later, he left this world and a month later I was giving the eulogy. I wish in my life, I could go back and just stop and say, ‘Hey, how you doing?’

“I know it’s not what you asked, but it’s on my heart. I just shared with the team like, it’s a time in this world for us to be kind to people.”

I was like, ‘I need to catch up with Adrian.’ And a week later, he left this world and a month later I was giving the eulogy. 

– Matt Rhule, Head Coach, Nebraska Football

In my view, Rhule is absolutely right. You can be a high achiever, physically fit and professionally successful and still feel deeply depressed. Occasionally, folks will carry their depression like a neon sign, but they usually don’t. And if you ask somebody if they’re doing okay, most of the time, they’ll say they are. To build a relationship of trust, to help somebody feel vulnerable enough to be honest, requires you to know that person. To dig. To be there. And that takes time.

I lost my dad to suicide when I was 19, after a long struggle with myriad mental illnesses. One thing that kept me going was knowing there were so many other folks in my life who loved and cared about me. The kinds of people who could help me turn off my own internal self-destruct button. I had lots of dads, uncles, cousins and brothers who weren’t blood relatives. I still do. You probably do, too.

I pray that my girls have the luxury of having those people in their lives and that they’ll grow up to be that figure in the lives of others. That’s how you fight against the darkness that creeps up in many of us. That’s how you move the earbuds out of the ears and force folks to engage with reality.

That’s how you win.

—Matt Brown