ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Ford Higgins was still a plebe, trying to get through a calculus class and still trying to get on the field for Navy’s football team. Fellow freshmen Brad Alexander and Tom Evans, a pair of lacrosse players, joined him in grappling with the advanced mathematics.

But at times, a thought was broached. Higgins, a gregarious offensive lineman, was a crease attackman at his Georgia high school. Maybe, just maybe …

“We would kind of halfway joke about it: ‘I want to come out and join you guys senior year,’” Higgins said. “It kind of became a [thing that] every now and then got brought up, but never so serious. It was always a ‘what-if-this-happened?’”

Alexander and Evans went on to become the Midshipmen’s lacrosse captains this season, the program’s first under coach Joe Amplo. Higgins was a two-year starter at center and one of Navy’s four football captains in 2019. He was also elected captain of captains by the leaders of all of the academy’s varsity teams.

And that running joke? It’s happening, with Higgins shaking off some lacrosse rust in the final months before graduation as Navy enters its season opener Friday against Manhattan.

It is challenging enough to balance the rigors of the academy with one sport. Attempting a two-sport approach, even just for a year, could seem daunting.

“I think it’s crazy,” said senior defenseman Jack Hogan, a friend of Higgins’ since both were plebes. “Being in-season takes a big toll on your body, and coming from a very hard-fought football season and having the success that they did, they were putting in all the hard work and extra time, and to come right into our season of lacrosse, it’s got to be [hard]. He’s just an animal. It’s pretty impressive how he’s making the transition.”

Yet for Higgins, it seemed a perfect way to close out his time at Navy, especially since he was used to year-round football commitments anyway.

“The guys right now are already in the grind of offseason workouts, and that’s a very time-consuming thing,” Higgins said. “The big part for me is, I wasn’t going to have that piece of being a part of that team anymore, and that’s something I wanted to be a part of as long as I could and as long as I had an opportunity to. Thankfully, that opportunity came up. I feel like it’s a great way to continue being part of something bigger than yourself.”

Higgins picked up lacrosse in fifth grade and played it through his time at Greater Atlanta Christian School, where one of his coaches was former Loyola long pole Scott Ratliff. Because of football demands, he didn’t play on any club teams while in high school.

His first serious thought of returning to the game came over the summer. Higgins had come to known Eddie McKinnon, the Midshipmen’s 2002 captain and a neighbor of Higgins’ sponsor family, and McKinnon reached out to Amplo with a recommendation.

It didn’t take long for Amplo to realize how much of an asset Higgins would be and assured the senior he would have a place on the roster once football season concluded.

“He’s got this undeniable presence about him,” Amplo said. “The first moment I met him, I noticed how captivating he was. He’s got this glow about him, he really does. He has a smile on his face, he’s confident. He’s not overly confident. He’s got this gentle confidence about him. He’s so sure of himself that I said to myself when he came in to talk to me, ‘You have to be around our people.’”

Higgins doesn’t lack for experience in facing the challenges presented to an athlete at Navy. Like all of his teammates, in football and lacrosse, he faces academic demands. But he was also a pivotal figure in the Mids’ riveting football turnaround this past fall.

A year after Navy posted a 3-10 record — its worst in 16 years — it went 11-2, ended a three-year slide against Army, won the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy, tied Memphis atop the American Athletic Conference’s West Division and went on to beat Kansas State in the Liberty Bowl.

“Why wouldn’t I take the captain of captains?” Amplo said. “As we’re trying to start a new culture here, why wouldn’t I take the guy whose peers have elected as their leader, has been through all these moments with the guys down the hall? Why wouldn’t I do it that from an organization standpoint? Whether he can help us on the field or not, he’s going to be a positive influence one way or another.”

It already started to happen in the preseason. In the final week of January, Higgins became the first player since Amplo arrived to request the chance to speak to the entire roster. It was a bit of empowerment Amplo found encouraging, even if he didn’t expect it to come from one of the program’s newest players.

“One of the biggest attributes that he’s bringing right now is his leadership,” Hogan said. “He’s a very vocal guy, and he’ll put his two cents in. We were having a team meeting, and he asked our coach if he could say a few words about some stuff, and it was awesome.”

One of Higgins’ side benefits for playing lacrosse is slimming down to meet the weight requirements for the Marine Corps, his service selection. Prior to Navy’s late-December bowl game, he weighed 257 pounds. Between major changes to his diet and his work on the lacrosse field, he was down to 227 pounds in late January with the hopes of getting to 214 by graduation.

Yet there’s also glee in returning to a sport he enjoyed so much while growing up.

“What’s great is, I’m learning so much, not just from coach [Brad] Ross and coach Amplo, but all the players as well,” Higgins said. “I’ll do one thing and they’ll say, ‘Try it this way and do this that way.’ It’s sweet. It’s great to be able to be out there with those guys and have a stick in my hand and be able to throw it around.”

Higgins was an effective FBS offensive lineman despite giving up dozens of pounds to most defensive tackles he faced, so his athleticism isn’t in question. However, a lacrosse attackman faces different demands than a football center, and there is an adjustment period from one sport to the other.

“He has every bit of aptitude, so he’s got the potential, but you can tell his skills have not been polished,” Amplo said. “He’s been in a three-point stance for four years. You can tell. But he’ll do some things where you say, ‘All right, I see it.’ He’s a sponge for knowledge. I think he gets frustrated at times because he wants to do the things his mind is telling him to do. If he’s patient with this process and we’re patient with him, I would be shocked if he doesn’t fill some small role for us at some point in the year.”

For Higgins, the experience itself is already something he is savoring as the end of his college years draw ever closer.

“I’m having a great time,” Higgins said. “I definitely am. I want to keep getting better and better and better.”