Athens, Ga. – They were the most tense, most interesting moments of the Georgian football season, probably the most interesting in the entire college season: an epic game against Georgia Tech, which stretched out to eight apparent and accompanied by midnight. And when Nazir Stackhouse stood on the side line, he fought the inner battle.
Stay awake, he kept thinking. Someone’s score and end it. Stay up. He doesn’t sleep.
This happened a few years ago in Tennessee. Georgian crime was on a long ride and stackhouse, nasal equipment, was on a bench with the rest of the defense lines.
“I’m on the bench fighting sleep and I’m fighting it,” Stackhouse said.
Then it happens so often, BAM. He was out.
Stackhouse was diagnosed with narcolepsy during the first year in Georgia. During his career he started 42 games and won two national championships. Now it is a view of the NFL proposal, yet it still deals with the condition every day – or every minute -.
For one thing, Stackhouse rarely controls. He has a license, but he always has someone in the car and keeps the rides short. She never sleeps when he’s on the playground during the game, whether it’s a game or training. He fell asleep during the meeting, but the coaches worked with him; Kirby Smart was known to be leaning to tap Stackhouse: “Right, Nazir? Right?”
Former defense Linman Gruzie Nazir Stackhouse was screened from the fourth to seventh round in the NFL 2025 design. (Pictures Kirby Lee / Imagn)
“Yeah, yeah, coach,” Stackhouse replied, woke up.
“More than once,” Smart said with a laugh. “It was real. I have never seen a guy on the side line in the game.”
Smart imitated to go to sleep.
“But it’s a great child,” Smart said. “As soon as they got it under control, it wasn’t a big problem. … it never affected his performance.”
NFL people who tend to project Stackhouse anywhere from the fourth to the seventh round do not think that narcolepsy is a problem. One scout from the area said it “sounds like he had a handle on him, so I wouldn’t say it with a red flag or something.”
“It’s new to me,” said Scout from the second area. “I didn’t have it before with the player. Coaches say it’s not a problem.”
Stackhouse talks about the state freely, how he suddenly intervenes and cannot help, but at some times laugh. Once slept on a treadmill. He felt it came, and so he grabbed the railing, then another thing he knew he woke up.
“And I’m glad,” damn how long have I been out? “I look down.
According to national institutions, healthy symptoms usually begin with narcolepsy usually aged 7 to 25 years and are often incorrectly diagnosed. The exact cause is unknown, there is no medicine and the condition will be lifelong. It is a rare condition that is estimated to be in about 0.002 percent of the American population. However, some symptoms can be managed by a combination of drugs and lifestyle changes.
The stackhouse is an athlete helps. Nih says that everyday exercise at least 20 minutes improves the quality of night sleep and reduces “excessive daily drowsiness”. Healthy eating also helps, so the approach to the Georgian training table has been beneficial in the last few years.
Stackhouse dealt with it long before college. He grew up on Stone Mountain, Ga., He fell asleep in the classroom. His mother began to take him to sleep when he was 11. The family didn’t think it was a big problem at first. Then, as he ages, the problem did not disappear, but it was too expensive to obtain official diagnosis or even treatment. When he got into Georgia, his mother asked medical staff to test his son, and narcolepsy was confirmed.
Georgia connected him with a lung doctor in Athens, and Stackhouse took medication, Wakix, about a year, but stopped because it hurt his heads. Stackhouse looks at other possible medicines, but otherwise he has only years to do it himself. If he feels sleep, he moves around, if he can or take preventive measures such as time on the treadmill.
“It never affected me on the pitch,” he said. “It was if I was stationary, comfortable. This is where it will hit.”
In the field, Stackhouse seemed to have not been influenced. He played as a reserve in the Georgian teams 2020 and 2021, which had a remarkable collection of defensive line talents, including Jordan Davis nasal tools and defensive equipment of Jalen Carter. When Davis left after the 2021 season, Stackhouse took his initial work. In the semi -final of the college play -off football played he had three pulleys and rush CJ strudes and tools for loss in the National Championship game.
Stackhouse dealt with narcolepsy from the field, often during games. When the game was in hand and the appetizers were withdrawn, Stackhouse headed to the side line and fell asleep.
“It certainly didn’t affect my gaming,” he said. “But say we played one of them, I don’t know, I would say under the talented teams. I would play one or two quarters. Then I was on the side line. We had a tent and literally sat down and watched the boys play. And I fell asleep.”
However, he did not do during the epic victory over Georgia Tech. In fact, Stackhouse fought so well that when he returned home, he couldn’t sleep for three hours.
“Narolepsy is so unpredictable,” Stackhouse said. “Because people are like,” Are you tired, are you tired? “No, I’m not tired, I just fell asleep.
Dane Brugler contributed to this story.
(Upper Photo: Todd Kirkland / Getty Images)
