Quentin Lake got the news on the field after practice, so there was no other place he wanted to pass it along.
The Rams’ safety trotted into the locker room, picked up his phone and waited until teammates had filed in and left the field empty.
Then he quietly made his way back outside, took a deep breath and placed the call.
“Dad,” he said, trying to hide his excitement, “I was elected a team captain.”
Carnell Lake choked up a bit.
“You’re only in your third year!” he told his son, pride rippling through the connection. “‘I didn’t get elected captain till I was 10 years in. Man, I’m proud of you.”
The emotional August exchange, on the eve of the Rams’ season, was another bonding moment for father and son.
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Carnell, a star at Culver City High and UCLA, played safety and cornerback for 12 NFL seasons, 10 with the Pittsburgh Steelers from 1989 to 1998. He was an All-Pro, a five-time Pro Bowl selection and was named to an NFL 1990s All-Decade team.
Quentin, who also played at UCLA, is a leader and something of an ironman for a Rams team that rebounded from a 1-4 start to make the playoffs.
“Football,” Quentin said of his relationship with his father, “is our love language.”
Quentin’s lineage comes through in his approach, his maturity and his play, Rams coach Sean McVay said. A love for the game, understanding of nuances and “emotional intelligence,” as McVay put it, enables the 25-year-old to navigate situations and connect with other players.
“You definitely feel that pedigree based on the love that he has and that relationship that he has with his father,” McVay said.
Carnell played in 17 playoff games, including a Super Bowl XXX defeat by the Dallas Cowboys in 1996.
On Monday night, Quentin will start his second postseason game when the Rams play the Minnesota Vikings in an NFC wild-card game at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Ariz.
Because of safety concerns related to the wildfires in Southern California, the NFL moved the game from SoFi Stadium.
“You want to remind guys that when stuff like this happens, it’s bigger than the game of football,” Quentin said of his role as a captain, “but at the same time we can use this game to give L.A. hope.”
By design, Quentin’s journey to the NFL was made without a push from his father.
Despite Quentin’s request for his father to coach him in youth sports — “I wanted to learn all the tricks of the trade,” he said — Carnell declined.
“If you grow up enjoying it without feeling pressure,” Carnell said, “I think it’s going to be more about him.”
Carnell never pushed football. He told his son that if he wanted to be an engineer, be an engineer. If he wanted to be a doctor, be a doctor.
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“He always said, ‘It’s your life, and you’re going to have to one day make a decision of what you want to do,” Quentin said. “Luckily, he was such a good role model that that’s exactly what I wanted to do was be a football player and go to the NFL.”
Quentin played at Santa Ana Mater Dei before following in his father’s footsteps to UCLA. Carnell, who had coached for seven seasons with the Steelers, left his position so he could watch.
“I said, ‘I don’t want to miss that,’” Carnell said.
Carnell, though, continued to keep his distance.
“He never wanted to overstep,” his son said.
But in 2018, after watching a Bruins practice where Quentin played a coverage incorrectly, Carnell offered a bit of unsolicited advice.
“He was kind of listening like, ‘Hey Dad, you played a long time ago,’” Carnell said, laughing. “So I looked at it like, he’s not listening to me.”
Not much changed after USC receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown burned the Bruins for a long touchdown late in the season.
The next week, however, St. Brown’s brother, Osiris, scored on a similar play for Stanford.
“At that point, I was like, ‘Yeah, I’ve got to listen — he knows what he’s talking about,” Quentin said, chuckling. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
“So from that point on, we started really diving into the film and how can I improve my game — and my game took off.”
The Rams selected Lake in the sixth round of the 2022 draft. He was sidelined for much of his rookie season because of a knee injury, but last season his versatility helped the Rams rebound from a 3-6 start to make the playoffs.
As the Rams prepared for this season, first-year defensive coordinator Chris Shula regarded Lake as a building block for a unit making up for the loss of retired star defensive lineman Aaron Donald. After linebacker Troy Reeder suffered a hamstring injury, Lake assumed signal-calling duties.
“We had that vision of being able to move him around and play wherever we needed to fit the defense,” Shula said. “He’s excellent in coverage. He’s a physical player. He is obviously really smart, so he is a guy that you can do a lot of different things with.”
Quentin, 6-foot-1 and 196 pounds, said he has benefited from the expertise of Rams coaches as well as his sessions with his father.
Carnell recalled one they shared during Quentin’s down time.
“We stayed up till 2 in the morning watching film, and he showed me his notebook,” Carnell said. “I was like, ‘You gotta be kidding me.’ He’s already ahead of me. His penmanship and his notetaking skills are impressive.
“Mine is like chicken scratch.”
Quentin disagrees. His father had “multiple notebooks for one team,” when he was a player, and now offers “full Power Point presentations” to his son.
“My notes are good,” Quentin said, “but his notes are far and beyond.”
Lake has applied the lessons. He went into the final week of the season as one of only four NFL players to play every defensive snap. The streak ended only because McVay rested or minimized snaps for starters in the season finale.
Lake’s success does not surprise defensive backs coach Aubrey Pleasant.
“He’s such a stickler for the details that sometimes I have to tell him to give himself some grace, allow himself to be a little more kind to himself,” Pleasant said. “That’s something you want as a coach. You want to be able to pull back on the reins, as opposed to feeling like you’re always pushing them to move forward.”
Lake, a role model for teammates on the field, he also strives to lead by example in other areas.
This season on his off days, Lake was on hand for the dedication of a football field the Rams installed at the Nickerson Gardens housing complex in Watts. He also was among a number of Rams players that pitched in at a construction site in North Hollywood that will eventually be homes for military veterans.
“It’s being able to take a step back really from football and saying I’m a human first, how can I help other people,” he said after mixing and moving wheelbarrows full of cement.
Rams rookie safety Jaylen McCollough attempts to follow Lake’s example.
“You want to be an all-around pro, and that’s on the field and off the field,” McCollough said. “And so any nuggets you can take or just learn from Q, you just got to be a sponge.”
That is how Quentin approaches the lessons his father passes along.
In honor of Carnell, Quentin has always worn jersey No. 37, the number his father wore.
“I thought about changing it when I got drafted,” Quentin said. “I’m like, ‘Yeah, I’m on my own journey.’ But you know what, 37 is just me.”
Former Steelers coach Bill Cowher, a studio analyst for CBS, apparently recognizes the similarities between father and son.
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After Quentin and Rams defensive lineman Kobie Turner taped a television segment this season, Cowher sent Lake a video message, relaying a story about a sideline conversation he had with Hall of Fame safety Troy Polamalu.
“Troy was having a tough time, and Troy came back to the sideline and coach Cowher was like, ‘Troy, you’re good. You’re good,’” Quentin said. “And Troy said, ‘I’m just trying to be like Carnell Lake.’
“I was like, ‘Wow. That’s crazy.’”
Now Quentin hopes to one-up his father.
He wants to not only play in a Super Bowl but be a captain for a team that wins a ring.
“I’d come home and be like, ‘Yeah, I’ve got this,’” Quentin said, shaking his ring finger. “That would be cool.”
And another proud moment for father and son to share.
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
