“I know it’s caught fire not only in our class,” she said, “but some friends and family of Matt have bought them, too. Everyone’s just so proud of him.”
The admiration comes from a place of deep knowledge about the lengths Ganyard went to get here.
Ganyard arrived at UVA the first time as a lifelong soccer player who aspired to kick for the football team. In spring 2009, the second semester of his second year on Grounds, Ganyard tried out for the Wahoos – “I got nine [field goal attempts]. I went 9 for 9,” he said – but was told he didn’t make the team via an email. It’s a rejection letter that then traveled with Ganyard as far as the Middle East.
Shane Caffrey is a fellow Marine pilot who bunked with Ganyard during a seven-month deployment across the Mediterranean Sea, beginning in the summer of 2017. Caffrey’s ship bed was on top of Ganyard’s, and they’d often use the same outlets to charge their electronics.
“And any time I had to unplug his iPad, his screen would light up and you’d see it,” Caffrey said.
Ganyard’s iPad background is now of his 3-year-old daughter, Savannah, but, for a long while, it hosted a screenshot of the denial message he received from the UVA football team 16 years ago.
“It was a little bit of motivation,” Ganyard said.
Aside from Ganyard’s wife, Marie, a UVA alumna, Caffrey may be chief among those who can attest to Ganyard’s passionate pursuit of his dream.
With each other through nearly every post in the Marines – from training at the Basic School to flight school to deployment – the duo’s bond is such that Caffrey was part of Ganyard’s customary sword arch at Ganyard’s wedding and vice-versa.
So when the USS San Diego, the ship that carried Ganyard, Caffrey and crew six years ago, docked in various locations, Caffrey was eager to execute the rarest of squadron mate duties: He shagged footballs.
“One time in Jordan,” Caffrey said of the Middle Eastern country, “Matt brought out his ball and tee, and he just started kicking on this turf soccer field. He kicked for like 30 minutes or so, to an hour, and he was hitting what seemed like 50-yard field goals.
“There were no uprights, but his target was over the soccer net. And a bunch of us were chasing the balls.”
A similar scene played out in Thailand. And even when the ship was moving, Ganyard would cater his weight training to strengthen his kicking skills.
Once the ship came back to the California coast in February 2018, Ganyard, while stationed at Camp Pendleton, would spend his weekends competing at kicking camps typically reserved for teenagers seeking college recruitment.
“His wife would go to some of the camps with him,” Caffrey said. “And Marie’s fantastic. They’d ask her, ‘Oh, is your son out here?’ And she’d say, ‘Oh, no, my husband’s right there. He’s kicking.’”
No matter how odd the circumstance, Ganyard’s made the best of it.
His departure from the Marines eventually led him – and his family – back to Charlottesville and Darden, where he enrolled last fall. An aspiring consultant, Ganyard balances the rigors of business school, fatherhood and now, football.
At 鶹ƽ appeal, the NCAA granted Ganyard a year of eligibility just four days before the start of the Cavaliers’ fall training camp.
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