For Rick Morgan, football has always been a way of life. The values the game taught him throughout his playing career at Wagner College now help him save lives working as a resident physician in the COVID-19 unit at Larkin Community Hospital in Miami, Florida. 

"I always knew that I wanted to play college football," Morgan remembers.

But just as a running back sometimes needs to cut back and change direction to reach the end zone, Morgan did not take the path he had originally imagined.

The Florida native found in Wagner College exactly what he was looking for: a small school with a Division I football program. Initially, Morgan leaned towards majoring in business, but as time went on he found another passion: science. With the help of Wagner's faculty, he changed majors.

"I took several Biology classes and fell in love with it," he said. "My classes were small and I got to know my professors very well. I found myself getting involved with research and realized my affinity for neuroscience. From there, I took the steps needed to get into medical school and was lucky enough to pursue my dream."

Morgan graduated from Wagner with much more than a degree in biopsychology in 2012. His playing career as a Wagner running back had also played a big part in preparing him for medical school at Nova Southeastern University.

"There are a lot of challenging times during medical school and I think that my time as an athlete helped me push through. As an athlete, you learn to overcome adversity and sometimes you surprise yourself as to how much you are capable of."

Throughout his journey from football player to doctor, Morgan found inspiration in none other than Walt Hameline, his former head coach and current Seahawk athletic director.

"'Find A Way To Win' was a major theme during my time at Wagner and that still resonates with me. Being in a position to help patients overcome obstacles, physicians need to have a strategy and are sometimes required to think outside the box in order to reach treatment goals."
 
Having coached many successful players throughout the years, Hameline knows the kind of player it takes to win football games. "Ricky was a hard worker, on and off the field," Hameline said, "and you could see his drive and passion for the game in every rep. Championship teams are built around guys like Ricky who put the team first at all times."

With the COVID-19 pandemic on the horizon, his hospital called on Morgan to "find a way to win." On the football field, running backs need to be flexible and perform a lot of tasks, from blocking to receiving and running the ball. In the hospital, Morgan was forced to show his flexibility once again.

"Our ICU was transformed into the COVID unit overnight, and I was asked to join the team. We started seeing our first patients in March and the unit quickly reached maximum capacity." Working around the clock at Larkin Community Hospital, Morgan has treated patients from many different backgrounds in the last three months. 

"Our hospital has a very diverse patient population and we see a lot of patients from prisons, nursing homes, and the cruise lines. We have patients from around the globe." During the crisis, every day is game day for Morgan, and the hospital has found a way to win: "The protocol we started at our hospital has had relatively good outcomes. We have been able to extubate a lot of patients and get them off the mechanical ventilator."

Morgan drew parallels between the current crisis and his time on the gridiron.

"Nurses, respiratory therapists, physical therapists, dieticians and physicians each have a key role and work together to achieve a goal. Everyone has to be on the same page and work in concert, especially with a critical patient. In football, the goal is to beat the other team and in medicine it is the disease." 

Perhaps the biggest key to finding a way to win on the football field is having a great team. For Morgan, being a great teammate and being a part of great teams is something he's experienced many times in his life, starting with his family. From taking him to football games as a child to providing him with support throughout his playing days, Morgan's family has been a great team for him. To this day, his father serves on the Wagner College Board of Trustees, while his relatives in the New York area helped him feel close to home at all times while he was in school.

After the COVID-19 pandemic, Morgan will be working in Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation and wants to specialize in spinal cord injury, a form of medicine that requires a lot of different medical professionals to come together: "It involves a lot of teamwork and motivation. These patients have to adapt to an abrupt lifestyle change. Our goal as clinicians is to help the patient regain function and independence". 

While he is putting in long hours helping patients in Florida right now, Morgan is still connected to his Seahawk teammates on a regular basis: "I'm still very close with them. We talk every week. We have a special relationship that is rooted in our college days. We still try to see each other as much as possible, even though we are in different parts of the country."

Morgan's story of saving lives serves as an inspiration today — but to his former teammates, it's not surprising.

"Ricky made me work harder off the field to be a better student. Every day, rather than wasting time, he was in the study lounge on our floor," said Steven Ciocci, Morgan's former roommate and teammate. Ciocci is currently an offensive line coach at Bryant University. "I remember being so pumped, blocking for him during his senior year against Monmouth in 2011."

At the moment, one of the things Morgan looks forward to the most is seeing his Seahawks play in the Sunshine State this fall. Wagner is scheduled to play the University of Miami in September, a matchup between Morgan's alma mater and his favorite team growing up.

"I remember watching games at the Orange Bowl. It was a special environment. Many former Hurricanes inspired me and got me excited to play the game. I'm looking forward to a good tailgate and game and catching up with some college buddies." 
 
Football is more than a game, and it will continue to play an important role in Ricky Morgan's life. From serving as an inspiration to a motivation, the game has guided him through life and still helps him during the COVID-19 pandemic, where he is reminded every day of his goal: Find a way to win!