Strzelecki said he felt something odd in his helmet during practice Tuesday, but thought it was only a tangled lock of hair or sweat beading up as the team worked on extra points.
“I kept hitting, and it just kept bothering me,” Strzelecki told theBenton County Daily Record. During a break about 15 minutes into practice, Strzelecki took off his helmet and initially believed his teammates were teasing him.
“It looked like a rubber snake, and I thought somebody had pulled a practical joke on me,” he said. “When I grabbed it by the tail, that’s when it jerked, and I dropped the helmet.”