RALEIGH, NC (WTVD) – NC State Football finished with a win on Saturday, as did a fan who, with the help of Wolfpack’s own Kevin Keatts, would have had some explanations when he got home.
Raleigh’s Will Yadusky recently celebrated his 16th wedding anniversary and was out with friends outside Carter Finley Stadium ahead of the Furman game when he lost his wedding ring.
Yadusky said he was working on the grill when a renegade hot dog fell to the ground; he immediately grabbed it to throw it in the trash.
“I took a melted hot dog with me,” said Yadusky. “The point at which I realized this was just snapping my hands like crazy and hearing that kind of pinball ding-dong-dong and realizing, oh, that was my wedding ring.”
So the symbol of binding love was now loosely in the parking lot.
Neighboring Pack fans rushed to help, some pulling up their cars or driving them out of their designated places to search the ground for his ring.
Yadusky said that he heard a voice from behind.
“Someone says, ‘Coach Keatts ?!’ And I look up and there is the man himself, “said Yadusky. “And he says: ‘What – what are we looking for?'”
Over the next few minutes, Yadusky said Keatts, who was on his way to the game, stopped to help, raked the grass with his hands, and tried to find his wedding ring.
“He said, ‘You know, I don’t know if we can let you go home without finding it,'” Yadusky said. “I figured well, I appreciate your concern, I do.”
Yadusky said the state’s basketball coach provided some pointers about the game:
“‘Don’t think of it as a linear search – it probably wasn’t straightforward.'”
In fact, within seconds of Keatts leaving, it was there, mixed with the gravel, a few feet from where it had blown up.
“The fact that he took five or ten minutes of his time on match day was the part that really mattered to me,” said Yadusky. “I’m happy to know that he’s as good in real life as a guy he appears to be on TV.”
Yadusky immediately tweeted his thanks to Keatts, who expressed his relief in a reply.
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