And that evening when Isaiah went to bed, even without benefit of having watched the lopsided contest on television or developed any visual images for a mind's eye instant replay, a goal was set and a course plotted. Isaiah Kacyvenski, who had never even been in a peewee league to that point or so much as strapped on one of those flimsy plastic helmets from the basement toy department of the local Woolworth's store, determined he would play in the NFL.

Fourteen years later, as Kacyvenski prepares to depart Thursday for a Seattle Seahawks weekend minicamp, and he relates the story of his football epiphany via telephone from his dorm room, the random thought hits: Why couldn't this kid, like 150 million or so other Americans, have watched Super Bowl XX on television?

The answer is part of what makes Isaiah Kacyvenski, the fourth-round draft pick of the Seahawks and the highest prospect in NFL history ever to be selected from Harvard, more than simply a pretty good football story.

Beyond the obvious anomaly of having been drafted from an Ivy League institution better known for producing doctors and lawyers and Nobel laureates, his is a rare saga of a young man who overcame more than the fact that his sometimes splintered family didn't own a television -- not even an old, black-and-white model -- until after Isaiah, the youngest of five children, went off to college.

That he fell in love with football by twisting the dials on an AM radio and not flipping the remote control of a big-screen television of itself marks the young linebacker as a special case.

"Hey, it wasn't until a couple months ago, I think, my father actually got cable," said Kacyvenski, who will graduate in a few weeks with a degree in environmental sciences and public policy, and who will put medical school on hold while he pursues his NFL dream.

"And I think he only did that so he could watch the draft. I guess you could say we had some rough times."

The league is filled, of course, with pseudo-Horatio Alger tales of the kid who pulled himself up by the cleat straps and used football as a touchstone to escape to a better life.

In fact, such sagas have become almost hackneyed, the plots are so similar and the heroes so trite. You can't turn on ESPN anymore without a feature aimed at plucking America's heartstrings or lionizing an athlete who beat long odds.

Certainly the tale of Isaiah Kacyvenski fits the genres. In many ways, however, it defines an epic struggle and serves as a model of perseverance.

Green Bay vice president of personnel Ken Herock, one of the NFL's finest talent evaluators but a crusty, throwback-type scout more typically concerned with 40-yard dash times than familial circumstances, could stock a bulging folder to overflowing with names of players he drafted who overcame disadvantageous social and economic situations.

But asked Tuesday morning what he knew about Kacyvenski, the longtime scout termed him "a real-life hero."

"You know the whole story?" Herock asked. "Somebody ought to buy the (movie) rights to it now. He's going to play in the league, not just because he's got enough talent, but because he is one of the greatest young people I've ever met. We were really interested in him. And even though we didn't take him, I know he's a kid whose career I'm going to follow. I mean, this is a kid I plan to root for. How could you not want someone like him to do well?"

How, indeed.

A feature story in Kacyvenski's clip file at Harvard describes his family as being one of "modest means" and alludes in passing to "personal tragedies" he overcame. But both those descriptions unwittingly trivialize what he and his siblings endured on their way to success.

His two sisters are teachers. One brother is in the Marines and another, a painter in New York, was recently cited as one of this country's 50 most promising artists. And then there is Isaiah, always the sports junkie of the family and the Kacyvenski kid whose motor always ran hardest.

He earned letters in football, wrestling and track in high school in New York and was one of the state's top pentathletes as a senior.

The official Seahawks scouting report on Kacyvenski describes him as "high energy" and that is a handle he accepts with pride. The Green Bay scouting report cites his "high character."

In a league that pays lip service to cleaning up its act, Kacyvenski is a pretty good starting point. The Ivy League stigma aside, he is a solid prospect and some feel can possibly become the Seahawks' starting middle linebacker in a couple years.

Although not invited to the NFL combine workouts, Kacyvenski impressed scouts with workouts on campus. He ran a 4.52 time in the 40, did 30 "reps" on the standard 225-pound bench press, had a 33½:-inch vertical jump and a standing long jump of 9 feet, 6 inches.

"There's nothing small-time about him," Seattle defensive coordinator Steve Sidwell said.

The same can't be claimed of his hometown. Endicott, N.Y., is a blue-collar town of about 10,000 residents, the original home of IBM within a few miles of the Pennsylvania border. It might not be a burg small enough for everyone to know their neighbors on a first-name basis, but folks there are familiar with the Kacyvenski family as one blessed with talented children and yet still cursed by the fates.

"Just for the kids to be as well-adjusted as they are," said Bart Guccia, the football coach at Union-Endicott High School, "is a testimony to their character."

Isaiah's father, David Kacyvenski, was a janitor whose problems with alcohol sometimes split the family, nearly rendered them homeless and often left them without electricity, heat or food.

There were weeks when the best evening meals Margaret Kacyvenski could scrape together came from the leftovers from the local supermarket. And then on the night of Nov. 10, 1995, Margaret was killed in a car accident and her death left Isaiah without his guiding light and biggest fan.

On the morning after his mother's death, Isaiah boarded a bus and accompanied his teammates to the Carrier Dome in Syracuse to play in a state quarterfinal playoff game. Tears streaming down his face from the opening kickoff, Kacyvenski, the undefeated team's co-captain, played what the local newspaper heralded as a "brilliant" game.

Time might eventually heal all wounds, but the mental trauma inflicted by the loss of his mother is still a scab at which Isaiah frequently picks. The memory of her steadfastness in holding together a family constantly on the brink and the strength of her will are characteristics Isaiah cannot forget.

To do so, he acknowledged, would be the first step in allowing her legacy to disintegrate, and he will not permit that. There is not a day that passes, he said, in which he doesn't feel her presence, her strength and her guidance.

"She died right about the time I was in the (college) selection process," Kacyvenski recalled last week. "And I wondered who I would talk to about it, you know, where I was going to turn. Funny thing is, I just talked to her every night. I'd lie awake in bed and ask her what I should do. And I think she pointed me the right way."

Apparently, she did, mysteriously directing him to a school and a football program in which he had no interest at all. Viewing himself as a "Rudy" wannabe, Isaiah desperately wanted to attend Notre Dame but then-coach Lou Holtz had no place for him.

Kacyvenski was directed to another Holtz, son Skip Holtz, and verbally committed to play for him at Connecticut before visiting Harvard as an afterthought.

Fearing the Ivy League school did not play the level of football that might lead to a career in the pros, Isaiah nearly canceled the visit. But once he arrived on campus, he realized his escorts "ate, slept and lived football."

The stereotype he had built up in his own mind dissipated and he was sold on the place.

As a freshman, Kacyvenski was assigned uniform No. 49 randomly by the equipment department. He had not worn that number in high school and hadn't requested it. But shortly after that, Isaiah found a Bible his mother kept. Highlighted was a passage, Isaiah 49, which is a hymn about a mother leaving her child. The passage is taped inside his locker.

Eerily, two years later, Isaiah's sister, Emily, unearthed an old photograph of their late mother dressed in a Harvard sweater.

"I hadn't remembered it at first," Kacyvenski said, "but she was always wearing that sweater. And for no reason. It's not like I had any family that ever went to Harvard or anything like that. But it was my destiny, I guess, to be here. I'm proud, for me and my family, of what I've done."

On the field, Kacyvenski was the Ivy League rookie of the year as a freshman and then he won all-conference honors each of the next three seasons. He is the only player in university history to start every game of his four-year career.

Kacyvenski established a school record for tackles (108) as a junior and then broke his own mark as a senior with 135 stops.

At 6-feet-1 and 252 pounds, and partial to cut-off T-shirts and blue jeans, he looks more like a jock than a scholar. And on the day SportsLine.com called him, he first had to fit in a daily 3½- hour workout before finding time for an interview.

Not surprisingly, the poster above his bed is a reminder. "Let no one outwork you today," it reads.

In a room that includes a variety of reminders taped to the walls -- "Focus" and "You determine your own fate" and "Commit yourself to constant self-improvement" -- it is the one that seems to best capsulize the Kacyvenski ethic.

"There have been times when I wished I had a chance to watch more videotape," Kacyvenski said. "Some days, there just aren't enough hours, you know?"

But he has budgeted his time well and will graduate with a 3.2 GPA. He fulfilled all the pre-med requirements by the time he finished his junior year, including a grueling organic chemistry course that is the bane even of those students who don't have to devote three or four hours daily to the practice field or the weight room.

Down the road, Kacyvenski still sees medical school and a long career as a pediatrician.

"I just love to work with kids," said Kacyvenski, who spent last summer as an intern at the Tufts Medical School. "It's something I've always wanted to do. Except really for football, it's what I most want to do."

The road Isaiah will travel for now, however, is the one to which he took the entrance ramp 14 years ago while camped in front of that old radio.

Unlike most prospects from Harvard, he is not viewed with skepticism by scouts and coaches around the league. Kacyvenski conceded there is an irony to the fact he once eyed Ivy League football with the same stereotype with which many NFL scouts regard it.

"A lot of people look at players at the Ivy League, particularly Harvard, very skeptically," said his agent, Brad Blank, a class act whose clientele characteristically reflects the respect with which he's held. "What they fear is that a player with such a degree has all sorts of options. I find Isaiah to be much more of an anomaly because he has as much desire to be in the NFL as any athlete."

The dream, Kacyvenski admitted, is not unlike the one harbored by others like him. But he has come a much longer way than most in an unusual style. There aren't many prospects, of course, whose college helmet shares a bookshelf with their medical tomes.

Despite the figurative miles he has placed between himself and his difficult background, he will never travel far enough to forget the obstacles he overcame and the travails that girded him for the NFL's challenge.

Three nights before the draft, he huddled with Blank and the agent offered him a bit of advice. He reminded Kacyvenski that the draft is a long process and there would come a time during the weekend when, surrounded by expectant family members and friends, Isaiah would need at least a few minutes of privacy.

"It's something I suggest to every client in the draft, to find a sanctuary, maybe a bedroom that is out of the way, and use it as a temporary sanctuary, somewhere they can just clear their mind," Blank said. "And Isaiah looked at me and said, 'Brad, my dad's house is pretty much one room. There is no place like that there.' And it really came home to me just how much he overcame to get to this point in his life and what a great story he is."

And so Isaiah spent the weekend of the NFL Draft close to the people with whom he shared some of his best and worst times. His father, sober now for nine years after seeking help at Alcoholic Anonymous, presided over the event.

Incredibly, David Kacyvenski is still rehabilitating from an accident that severely damaged both legs. Not long into the fourth round, when Isaiah's name flashed up on the television screen as the Seahawks' choice, there was a cheer from the crowd and a toast to the guest of honor.

Within minutes of his selection, Kacyvenski was outside, running around the block, in part to tame his runaway emotions and also to seek the few minutes of solace Blank had suggested. As he ran past the row homes and down the potholed streets, Isaiah recalled his mother and her part in all of this.

And he thought about the message, "Don't ever forget where you came from," that he has tucked in the top drawer of his desk.

"Everything that occurs in your life," he said, "is kind of a part of what you become. I know that I'm a better person, a tougher person, because of the things that have happened to me."