Thankful fan: Highland football players befriend special needs boy

The boys encircled her son without saying a word.

With their football gear still wet from the effort of the game, tears stinging their eyes, disappointment breaking their young hearts, the players knelt around Oakley Hansen and gave him something his parents didn't even know he was missing.

Born with spina bifida and hydrocephalus, 15-year-old Oakley Hansen has spent more of his life in a hospital than at home. Then in 2001, he suffered a traumatic brain injury that limited his intellectual capacity to that of a 3-year-old.

That is, unless you want to talk sports.

No one is quite sure where Oakley developed his passion for athletics. His parents, Melissa and Van Hansen, aren't sports fans and are unfamiliar with many of the names and factoids Oakley recites.

But the six football players who gather around him in his bedroom every Thursday certainly do. They pepper him with questions about which college Peyton Manning went to and who the running back is for the Vikings. He even tells them how old Brett Favre is, and with every correct answer, the boys grin and congratulate him, while he beams back at them.

"He blows our minds because he knows things that we don't even watch," said Melissa. "Sports resonates with him for some reason."

The unique friendship has an unlikely beginning.

Melissa Hansen decided to take a disabled neighbor to a fundraising dinner and auction at Highland High School last spring. Her son started to exhibit a love of sports after someone gave him some trading cards, and she thought she'd try to bid on a few sports memorabilia items for Oakley.

"I didn't win anything," she said, laughing at how it all began. "I never could have imagined it would turn into this."

As she left, Highland senior Chris Lloyd said his father approached her and asked if she'd like some of the players to visit her son, who leaves the house almost exclusively for trips to the hospital because his risk of contracting infections is so great.

Assistant coach Brandon Winn discussed it with the Highland captains, who didn't hesitate.

In many ways, George Heimuli, Alex Olsen, Chris Lloyd, Ono Tafisi, Peter Ferrin and Mason Keller are typical high school football players. They have all the swagger, charm and popularity that usually accompanies athletic success. They have friends, an opportunity to play a game they love, dances, dates, girlfriends and the camaraderie of a team.