Navy offensive line coach Ashley Ingram was asked to quantify the contributions senior Jake Zuzek has made to the school's high-profile football program.

He pointed to Zuzek's command of the Midshipmen's offense, his dependable blocking technique, his brute strength. They have combined to make the product of West Philadelphia Catholic High School the undisputed leader of a line that sets the table and tone for the Navy's run-heavy, triple-option attack.

But Ingram's appreciation for the Mids' 6-feet-2, 290-pound right guard essentially boiled down to the fact that Zuzek simply always shows up. Since the start of the 2012 season, and despite a list of ailments that have visited him throughout the ride, Zuzek has started 32 consecutive games. That longevity is eclipsed only by senior safety Parrish Gaines.

"Every time you look up, Jake is still there," Ingram said with admiration. "His ability to line up against 315-pounders for play after play after play and keep sticking his face in there - well, not a lot of guys want to do that. Jake keeps doing it at a high level, and he's doing it with bum shoulders and bum knees.

"Our entire offense is based on our linemen getting movement at the point of attack, and the point of attack is right behind the center or the guard," Ingram added. "Everything runs through Jake. He's almost flawless with his assignments. Not much throws him off in our offense. We are very fortunate that he's played so many games at such a tough position."

"Jake commands his position," added Navy head coach Ken Niumatalolo. "You know what you're going to get from him every day. When you play that position in our offense, you can't hide, because you're running into somebody at full speed for 60 or 70 snaps or more. It's like 'Here we go again, crash!' It's a pretty violent deal."

Zuzek is quite equipped to absorb and administer the violence that defines his role.

His teammates still buzz about the YouTube video that shows Zuzek, as an incoming freshman following a year spent at the Naval Academy Prep School in Newport, R.I., bench-pressing 500 pounds.

Brian Weathers, his high school offensive line coach, raves about Zuzek's toughness. That was evidenced memorably when, as a junior, Zuzek played through the fourth quarter and both overtimes in West Catholic's state championship game loss to Wilmington - with a lower leg fracture that had been initially diagnosed as a high ankle sprain.

As a freshman at West Catholic, Zuzek, then 6 feet, 200 pounds, was called up to the varsity at midseason and immediately became a fixture at center and guard. The Burrs recently celebrated their 50th straight league victory, a streak that began with the first game with Zuzek in the lineup.

The Burrs' bread and butter involved pounding the ball on the ground, which suited the rugged Zuzek perfectly. Not much has changed in Annapolis, where the Mids perennially field one of the most prolific rushing offenses in Division I.

"Option power football is an awesome thing," Zuzek said. "I think every offensive lineman dreams of just getting down in his stance then mashing people with a good running game. I know that every game we're going to have a chance to run it up in there. We take pride in grinding it out."

And Zuzek takes great pride in proving wrong the schools - among them Pitt, Temple and Villanova - that showed little interest in him after deeming him too short to be an interior lineman in their respective programs. Never mind that he already had grown to 6-2, 290 as a high school senior in a highly-regarded school that played in two state finals and never lost more than two games in any year during Zuzek's time there.

Navy did not hesitate to reach out to Zuzek, who comes from a high school that has regularly produced a handful of Division I signees. Zuzek will graduate with a Bachelor's in general science in May, when he hopes to be commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps.

"I was tickled pink when Jake made the decision [to go to Navy], even though he didn't have an inkling of what he was getting into or what it meant," said Steve Zuzek, Jake's father. "He was very determined to play Division I football.

"To me, football is the icing on the cake in all of this. My son is graduating from the one of the top 10 schools in the country. That makes me sit alone at night and say to myself, 'Damn, look what he's done and look where he's going.'"

Zuzek has come a long way from the days when his mother, Tina, refused to let him play football until the fourth grade. By that point, Jake had proved to be a decent baseball catcher and post player in basketball. By that point, the young Zuzek also was so stout that he was forced to play football against boys typically several years older and stronger than him, due to weight limits imposed at the Pop Warner level.

"In the fourth grade, I was playing with eighth graders, because I was so heavy. Back then, I was the kid getting hit and getting smashed every time," Zuzek recalled. "By the seventh and eighth grade, I was finally playing against kids my age and size in CYO football. I actually started learning the game and really understanding football."

The next stop on Zuzek's gridiron journey was the freshman team at West Catholic, where he didn't last long. With the Burrs' varsity offense in a midseason slump, some changes were made up front by head coach Brian Fluck, who granted Weathers his wish by promoting Zuzek, who promptly grabbed a starting role.

That marked a turning point for the big kid whose class-clown tendencies also were tempered by a nasty streak that complemented his impressive strength.

"Jake had a confidence about him even as a freshman. He showed from day one he was going to work hard and do things the right way. He was honest and straightforward. He didn't take crap from people," Weathers said. "He didn't talk much, but guys would just gravitate to him. He was a natural leader.

"He would put on a show in the weight room, and he got enjoyment out of putting somebody on his back and coming down on top of him. He was known as a guy who was pretty mean. We got used to hearing Jake yelling, 'Run it behind me!' when we were deciding which play to call."

"The coaches at West Catholic taught us the value of hard work and never giving up," Zuzek said. "They made me a better overall player. Every season there, I was hurt, but I never came out of the game."

Zuzek smiled as he recounted some of the examples that highlighted his toughness. As a sophomore playing in the league title game, he broke his hand, but only left the field long enough to get it taped heavily, before reentering to stay.

"It looked like he had a club on his hand," said Tina Zuzek, Jake's mother. One year later, she sat in horror during the state championship game while watching her son somehow play the fourth quarter and both overtime periods with what turned out to be a broken leg.

"His teammates carried him from scrimmage [line] to scrimmage," Tina said. "He didn't even go to the huddle. They would tell him the play [at the line]. I was having fits. He would not leave that game."

It was one of the ultimate examples befitting Zuzek's blue-collar background. His mother worked for nearly three decades for a children's clothes business. His father, once a carpenter who was forced to quit after rupturing two discs - the injury knocked him out of work for two years - has for the past 20 years been a head groundskeeper for a provider of cemetery properties and services.

Navy assistant coach Dale Pehrson, who recruited Zuzek, said he was sold quickly on the big kid. And the feeling was mutual, as Zuzek did not even visit the Naval Academy officially. A few weeks after Jake and his parents met Pehrson in a Philly diner, where he committed to Navy, there were Jake and his father, standing on Rip Miller Field in the pouring rain, watching the Mids practice before the Texas Bowl in 2009.

"I followed him to this diner, we ate hamburgers and [Zuzek] committed on the spot and never wavered," Pehrson said. "He got his application and physical done very quickly. He knew what he wanted. I knew he was the right fit for us. But I don't think anyone was looking at him as a guy who would come in and be a three-year starter."

"[Zuzek] was one of the toughest dudes at NAPS," said senior fullback Noah Copeland, who went through prep school with Zuzek and bonded with him. "There's never any complaining coming out of those guys [on the offensive line], especially Zuzek. I think he'd play with a bone sticking out."

Like Copeland, Zuzek gained respect by earning a varsity letter as a freshman on special teams. By his sophomore preseason camp, it was clear that Zuzek's strength, explosive first step and command of the Navy offense pointed him to the starting lineup.

Zuzek settled in as a part of Navy's offensive foundation, helping the Mids attain a no. 6 ranking in rushing offense, en route to an 8-5 finish in 2012. He rarely missed a play that year, during which he injured a shoulder that required surgery after the season.

He also made a season-turning play that year at Air Force, on a day when then-freshman quarterback Keenan Reynolds came off the bench to replace an injured Trey Miller and took over the offense for good. Zuzek made the biggest play in Navy's come-from-behind, 28-21 victory in overtime.

After Reynolds lost the snap in OT on the Falcons' goal line, Zuzek fell on the ball in the end zone to claim the game-winning score. The Mids then stopped Air Force on its ensuing possession to seal the victory.

"I've never held anything as tightly as I held onto that ball. Nobody was getting it out of my hands," Zuzek said. "I got a whole bunch of calls and texts from back home after that game. The message usually started with 'You've got to be kidding me.' It was a real big moment."

It was also a rare, spotlight moment for a relatively anonymous force - anonymous, that is, to the average fan following the ball too much to notice the important grunt work performed by the offensive line in general and no. 64 in particular.

Inside the Navy locker room, the respect for Zuzek and the way he goes about his work is deep. At a recent practice, due to persistent knee soreness, Zuzek was forced by the coaching staff to avoid contact drills by wearing a green jersey.

"He's a tough guy from Philly. He won't let anybody know the extent of his pain, but I think he's a tough softie at heart," senior center Tanner Fleming said. "He's always the first guy to check up on you when something is going on at home or in the classroom. And if you're not going hard enough in practice, he'll call you a couple of names, too."

"We know how sore and beat up he is, but there's Jake every day, getting padded up and ready to practice," right tackle Joey Gaston said. "When we watch film, we always see Jake driving back his guy off the line then going 10-15 yards down the field to get after a linebacker or a safety. He's an idol for the young guys."

"When I think of Jake, I think of the personification of a Philly guy - big, mean, a brawler. Off the field, he's as good a friend as I've ever had, Reynolds said.

He's been one of the most durable guys on the team. He wants to be out there for every snap. When coaches rotate [linemen] in practice to keep them fresh, he gets mad about it. I like that. I'll always owe him one."