Central's standout place-kicker's real passion is soccer

~ Tyler McNabb has caught 17 passes for 199 yards this season.

Central senior tight end Tyler McNabb has gone since September 2005 without getting what he calls a "real haircut" and his older brother, Bret, has been growing out his hair since June 2006.

During this time, the two have developed a fondness for long hair, even opting to get theirs braided by a Jamaican native on a family Caribbean cruise last March instead of climbing Dunn's River Falls as their mother, Nancy McNabb, suggested.

"That was pretty fun, but Tyler's braids were better than mine because his hair was a lot longer," Bret said.

Long hair is certainly in right now in the McNabb family. And the process of growing out and styling it is just one of many enjoyable experiences Tyler and Bret have shared together as brothers over the past two years -- a time when the two have built a new bond with each other.

Tyler McNabb, left, leads Central with 17 catches this season. He's caught one scoring pass for the Tigers, who host Jackson tonight at Houck Stadium. (Aaron Eisenhauer)

Bret is seven year older than Tyler. So while he was in high school, he always got along well with his younger brother, but never hung out with him that much as a friend. The difference in age, they said, caused each other to have different interests and friends and made Tyler too young to compete against Bret in sports.

Bret then went off to play soccer at Oakand University in Michigan from 2001 to 2005, where he did not get to see Tyler too often because of demanding practice schedules.

But over the two years since he has been home, that seven-year age difference no longer seems too large to either McNabb brother. And both have spent a great deal of time with each other, mostly spent on their greatest passion -- soccer.

Tyler is now the star player and about 8 inches taller than his older sibling. Bret has become his friend and coach, spending significant time helping Tyler become a better player through one-on-one drills and helping him put together an everyday weight lifting routine.

And the results have shown.

Tyler, a member of the Metro United Soccer Club of Southern Illinois, will follow in his brother's footsteps next fall by playing Division I soccer. He recently verbally accepted a scholarship offer to become a member of the nationally ranked Saint Louis University program, his family said. He credits Bret for helping him achieve this goal.

Many Tigers fans only know Tyler as one of the top offensive football players in Southeast Missouri. He leads the Tigers with 17 receptions for 199 yards. He has also successfully kicked 8-of-9 extra-point tries and 4-of-5 field goal attempts, with a 40-yarder his longest so far this season.

But Tyler considers himself an even better soccer player.

The 6-foot-3 senior received offers from various elite Division I soccer programs, including Creighton and Michigan. The Saint Louis program is ranked No. 14 by the NSCAA/adidas college soccer men's top 25 poll as of Oct. 1, and Michigan and Creighton are also in the top 15.

Tyler only went out for the Central soccer team his freshman season, playing on junior varsity. He opted to play football as a sophomore because he said he wanted a break from club soccer.

Tyler said football has made him into a more physical soccer player, and his father, Jeff, said college recruiters actually liked that his son was a football player. They told him that he could incorporate the physical play of football into his play as a soccer defender.

Tyler's decision to attend SLU is exciting for Bret on two levels, First, he helped Tyler develop his soccer skills over the past two years. Second, Bret is enrolled as a law student at the university.

"I tell my friends I'm retired now, but I'm living my soccer career vicariously through my brother," Bret said, laughing. "It's exciting for me because my brother and I have such an age difference, so we've never been at the same school together at the same time.

"When I was in high school, things were different [with Tyler]. All growing up, he was really young and he always wanted to hang around with me and my friends and do what I was doing. And when I was younger, I would be like, 'Tyler go hang around with your friends or quit copying off of me.' But as we've grown up more, I've been able to enjoy that [friend] aspect of brotherhood."

Bret said it was difficult sometimes to play so far away from home because and he did not get to see many of Tyler's games.

Tyler did visit Bret at Oakland about three weekends each soccer season, and he spent his entire eighth grade spring break in Michigan. At that time, Tyler was becoming more serious about soccer and wanted to run laps at the practice facility where Oakland trained while Bret and the other players were practicing one day.

Oakland coach Gary Parsons, however, would not let him because he told him that it could be a violation of a recruiting rule, even though Tyler was not yet in high school. So Tyler went outside in pouring rain to run. Parsons recruited Tyler this past year and Tyler e-mailed him back, jokingly telling the coach he did not want to attend Oakland because he made him run in the rain four years ago.

Bret played semi-pro soccer for the Michigan Bucks the summer after graduating, but returned to Cape Girardeau that August, where he began working in retail. In the summer of 2005, he took a position working for his father, who gave him some leeway with his schedule so he could spend even more time training Tyler in soccer. In addition to working with his brother individually, he also helped out as an assistant coach for Metro United.

Right at the time Bret was returning home, Tyler was switching positions, moving from midfielder/forward to defender.

"It was such an easy transition for Tyler because he's such a big player," Bret said. "But the main thing we needed to work on was kind of individual defending and reading the play, and he really caught on quickly with that."

Nancy said some of those one-on-one drills, which her sons ran in either the driveway or at Shawnee Park, became quite competitive. Jeff agreed, saying he has had to stop a few sessions because the brothers have gotten so physical with each other.

"It gets really bad," Nancy said. "If Tyler pokes the ball away or swims around him a little bit, Bret is all out to get him back. It ends up if one accidentally elbows the other one, then the next one is punching."

Nancy added Bret could also be a tough coach with Tyler.

"Bret will watch a game and when it is over for Tyler, he will say, 'These things you did great, but I saw this, and this is not what you're supposed to do,'" Nancy said. "And sometimes that is hard for Tyler to take."

Tyler said although things sometimes do get heated, he is thankful for the time his brother has put in helping him and that Brett is a major reason why he'll play Division I soccer next fall.

"A lot of it was from my brother," he said. "It is really cool because [Bret] is there helping me out along the way and helping me work out and practice. Over those years, he helped me out with everything, pretty much from lifting weights with him every day after school. If we weren't lifting, we were playing soccer and working on everything and getting in shape."

When the two are not training, they can be found dueling it out on the virtual soccer field in FIFA 2007 for PlayStation 3.

"They like to play all the different kinds of sports on that PlayStation," Jeff said. "They compete at that level also."

The trip to Collinsville, Ill., where the Metro United club is located, is about two hours from Cape Girardeau. Nancy typically drives and she said many of the times when Bret comes along, he and Tyler sit in the back playing video games with her alone in the front.

"I'm the chauffeur," Nancy said.

The two also enjoy sitting down together to watch and critique the English premier soccer fans. But the two are fans of rival teams as Bret roots for Manchester United and Tyler likes the Chelsea soccer club. The family also said this can lead to some heated discussions on which is the better team.

Bret said he has been a Manchester fan since about the sixth grade when saw the team on television. Tyler, on the other hand, learned about the Chelsea club through FIFA 1996 for Sega.

"You could pick your club team that you wanted to play with and my brother wanted to pick a different team than I was picking to play against me and he picked Chelsea," Bret said. "At the time, they were a really good team as well. He's not a fair weather fan. He stuck with them."

Nancy said both her sons are ready for next fall.

"Bret already can't wait," she said. "And he says, 'I hope Tyler will be included with the boys or the team.' I am sure he'll be at everything and I'm sure he'll try to peek in and watch practice, if I know my son. He knows [Saint Louis] coach [Dan] Donigan well, so we had to tell him, 'We don't want you to try to be an assistant coach.'"

Being at the same college, they said, will allow them to continue to do together the things they enjoy -- especially keep up their passion for soccer.

"The last few years since I've moved home, it has been tremendous and I've gotten to see him a lot," Bret said. "I really want to see him at that next step. I will definitely be at all the home games barring class times."