If you want to hear someone describe the thrill of playing in a Super Bowl, I recommend you talk to fellow Happy Valley resident Stefen Wisniewski.
The former Penn State offensive lineman participated in last year’s NFL championship game, and although it’s not his favorite topic, he can talk about that defeat of his Kansas City Chiefs by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. But if you want to see a very large smile on the face of a very large man, just ask Stefen about his Super Bowl wins with the Eagles and with the Chiefs.
I had the chance to do exactly that in a recent conversation with the 32-year-old Pittsburgh native. And I’m glad to share the highlights of our conversation, a chat that also touched on his Penn State memories and his current work as a ministry intern with Calvary Church.
Just a year ago, you and your Kansas City Chiefs teammates were preparing for Super Bowl LV against the Buccaneers. How is your life different these days?
Wisniewski: The NFL life is a crazy life. It’s a busy life. It can be stressful. The body’s tired, the mind’s tired, the body hurts. I’m less busy now and I’m in a lot less pain. I have more time to do ministry work and I definitely get to spend more time with family. And I get to live where I want to live as opposed to moving with whatever team I’m on.
As for your location, why did you choose to settle down in little ol’ Happy Valley rather than any of the five NFL cities where you played?
Wisniewski: I’ve always loved State College. My parents are Penn Staters and my dad played football at Penn State. I grew up in Pittsburgh, but we would come to State College for football games and I always thought it was a really cool town. Then I went to school here and just loved it—the town, the experience, my teammates. And in the NFL, you spend your season somewhere but for the off-season you can basically live wherever you want, so I always chose to come back to Penn State. There’s energy from the university, there’s always something going on. People describe it as a bit of a Penn State bubble, right? But it’s a happy bubble.
With the NFL’s biggest game just around the corner, I’d be interested to hear memories from your three Super Bowls.
Wisniewski: Well, you know, I try to forget that third Super Bowl. That was not memorable. When you said “three Super Bowls,” I was thinking, “Wait, I only won two.” So that’s just an introduction to say I have great memories from the Eagles’ Super Bowl (2018) and the Chiefs’ Super Bowl win (2020).
I think the moment when you first realize that you’re gonna win is the big moment. You have this burst of emotion and joy. In the Eagles’ Super Bowl, we were up eight points and the Patriots had the ball with like a minute left. They were on their own 8-yard line and they had no timeouts. So it would’ve been tough for them to tie it up. But they got to the 50-yard line with maybe five seconds left. And their quarterback is Tom Brady. Tom Brady…it’s never over if the other team’s got Brady. He throws up a Hail Mary, and because I play offense I’m just watching from the sideline. You kind of see the ball go up, and there’s six or seven guys waiting where the ball’s gonna come down in the end zone. I see it get tipped, knocked around a little bit, and I see it hit the ground. Then I look up at the clock and it says 0:00. And then it’s like, “Wait, is this real?”
I didn’t know what to do. I’m just in shock and joy and running around hugging people. When you’re playing, you have to control your emotions, but when it’s over, you just kind of let them out. The rush of joy and adrenaline is unbelievable. And then my wife, Hilary, came out on the field and we’re taking pictures with the trophy. It was so great to have her with me to celebrate. She was such an awesome supporter, friend, and helper through that journey. She sacrificed a lot and kind of “carried the team” for our family when I was busy with football stuff.
And I actually had an opportunity to pray after the game. That’s a tradition after every NFL game that players from both teams generally get together and pray on the 50-yard line. So even in the midst of the confetti and chaos and media and everyone running around, a bunch of guys and I got together and I led the prayer. I got to thank God, because ultimately I believe Romans 11:36—“For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever.” He gave me the abilities to get me to that point, and ultimately, I wanted to give all the glory to him.
Do you have a comparable memory from the Chiefs’ Super Bowl win?
Wisniewski: The ending to the Eagles game was a little more epic because the game was still on the line on the last play. With the Chiefs, we had locked it up—we went up two scores with like two or three minutes left. But the play where we clinched it was pretty special. We were up by something like three or four points with three or four minutes left, and we’re trying to run the clock out. If we can successfully get a first down or two, we’ll be able to run the clock down to zero and we’ll win. But if we get stopped, we’ll punt the ball and they’ll have a chance to beat us, right? The game’s on the line and we call a run play to the left, and I’m the left guard. And you know, in this situation, the defense knows we’re running the ball, so they sell out to stop the run and it’s hard just to get three or four yards. So the center and I double team the nose guard and then I get the linebacker. I had a nice block. All of a sudden, I hear the crowd cheering and I look over and I see the running back going down the field and I’m thinking, “He might score.” And then he’s gone. He scored. And that was the “Oh my gosh, we won” moment. So I’m high fiving my linemen, and we’re all feeling good about ourselves cause we blocked the play well enough to score a touchdown to win the game. Yeah, that moment when you realize you’re going to be a champion is pretty special. I had dreamed of that since I was a kid, and to win one in my seventh year after having six losing seasons in my first six years…pretty amazing.
The Super Bowl might be the most heavily documented sports event on the planet, but is there something about it that most people don’t realize?
Wisniewski: From a player’s perspective on the Super Bowl, it’s all about our thought process. Even though it’s the biggest game of our lives, we make it our goal to treat it like any other game. There’s a million journalists asking questions prior to the game, and I remember somebody asked, “Before the kickoff, are you gonna be reflecting on your whole career and how hard it was to get here?” And I said, “I hope not. I hope I’m just thinking about how to play well and win.” Obviously, when it’s over you can reflect on everything else.
I was reading through a summary of your career, and it’s extremely impressive. You were an All-American, a three-time Academic All-American, and of course a three-time Super Bowl participant. How do you account for all that success?
Wisniewski: It’s hard to sum it up, but I feel like the favor of God has been upon me. And that has nothing to do with me, right? God chooses whom he will pour his favor out on, and I feel like he’s chosen me to be especially blessed and have his favor. All the things you mentioned are great, but as awesome as it’s been to have a 10-year NFL career and to play in Super Bowls, I truly feel that my relationship with Jesus is better than any of those blessings. It was God who opened my eyes to be drawn into a relationship with him at a pretty early age. Age 18.
What exactly happened when you were 18?
Wisniewski: I had grown up in church, and my parents had exposed me to the message of Christianity, but until my senior year of high school, it wasn’t something that was personal to me. I was a really good student and I was a really good football player, so I thought my life was going pretty well. I think God had to wake me up to realize that I needed a relationship with Jesus. A couple of different events happened, but one of them was a car accident that was pretty bad.
Were you the driver?
Wisniewski: Yeah, I was, and it was 100 percent my fault. I was driving way too fast. And I went around this curve and hit the guardrail. And then I was swerving for a while. It ended up that I had totaled the car. Praise God that I wasn’t hurt and no one else was hurt. But it was bad enough that it really got my attention. It helped me realize that I had a heart full of pride and self-sufficiency, and those things are enemies to having a relationship with God.
Pride might be harmful to a person’s spiritual life, but that’s got to be a hard thing to overcome for an athlete who is in the limelight.
Wisniewski: Yes, and even though my battle with pride got better, it’s still a work in progress. Pride is looking down on others and thinking I’m cool because I’m marginally better at something than someone else. But humility is realizing how insignificant I am in comparison to an almighty God. One of my favorite Bible verses is Job 1:21 where Job says, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” Job realized that he came into this world with nothing and that he will depart with nothing. The same with me. Everything I have was given to me by God. Did I choose to be 6-foot-3 and 300 pounds? No, God made me that big.
When did you feel that you saw God working most dramatically during your NFL career?
Wisniewski: Great question. That 2017 Eagles season which resulted in us winning the Super Bowl is really a God story. During my first five years in the NFL, I started just about every game. And I thought I was an above-average starter. But for whatever reason, I wasn’t getting job offers to be a starter for the 2016 season. So I signed in Philly, but I was a backup that year. Then going into my seventh year, I signed in Philly again but it was still my goal to be a starter. I thought I was good enough to play, but I found myself as the fourth string left guard to start the season. I was frustrated, confused, not sure what was going on. I believed I was there for a reason, but I didn’t know what it was.
But God worked it out piece by piece. It started with the guy who was first string getting traded to a different team. So all of a sudden, I’m third string. Then the guy who started during weeks one and two didn’t play very well, and so they benched him. Now I’m second team but getting closer, and at that point they decided to rotate me and the other guy who they saw as slightly better than me. So we both played, which isn’t very common in the NFL. But by week four—I guess I played better than him in week three—I started. And eventually they just said, “All right, you’re playing well, so now it’s your job.” God had to open those doors, otherwise I might have never seen the field that whole year. God allows trials to happen in our lives for a purpose, and the purpose in my trial was to humble me, to shape me, to see if I would still trust him with my career kind of falling apart.
All of that happened before you ever went to a Super Bowl. So if you had quit, you wouldn’t have experienced all of those thrills…
Wisniewski: Yeah, it’s proof that if you can wait and be patient, God will ultimately reward those who are faithful to him. The hard thing is sometimes we have to wait for years, not just a few months.
How would you say your football career prepared you for the ministry?
Wisniewski: Because I’ve been in the NFL, I’ve had a platform to share my faith and to speak at various events with 10 people listening or over a thousand people. I certainly wouldn’t have been able to do that if I hadn’t been an NFL player, right? Not a lot of people show up to hear some random 24-year-old’s opinion on life. And I’ve also led Bible studies on my various teams which helped prepare me for ministry work. Also, in the NFL, you’ve got to battle through injury, adversity, doubt. All those things trained me to rely on God for strength.
What kind of ministry do you expect to do here in State College? I believe you’ve begun doing an internship while going through seminary?
Wisniewski: I’ll try to learn about all the things that Dan Nold does as a head pastor, and I’ll try to learn about the things that Stacy Sublett does as an assistant pastor. There are so many aspects that go into leading a church. Right now, I’m starting by working with Stacy on the men’s ministry at Calvary, which is fun. It’s been fun to help get men connected to each other and growing in their faith. But my internship will probably change over time. I’ll be doing it the next several years while I’m in seminary.
I want to finish with a couple questions related to Penn State football since that’s kind of important in this town. When you reflect back on your college career, what really sticks in your mind?
Wisniewski: One of the biggest areas is the friendships that I built with so many teammates. Ultimately, that’s the fun part, right? Making friends and kind of growing up together through college. And playing in Beaver Stadium, coming out of that tunnel and seeing 110,000 people, there’s nothing like that. And getting to play for Joe Paterno was an unbelievable blessing, especially cause my dad and uncle had played for him. I was part of a couple good teams while I was there, which was a blast. We won the Big Ten in 2008, and I got to be a starting guard on that team. Daryll Clark (the quarterback) had a great year, but we were loaded. I mean, Derrick Williams and Deon Butler and Jordan Norwood and Evan Royster. And we had a great defense, too, with guys like Jared Odrick and Navorro Bowman.
And to tie that back to your Super Bowl experiences, did any of those guys reach out with special congratulations after your Super Bowl wins?
Wisniewski: I actually had a bunch of my Penn State buddies at the Eagles’ Super Bowl. I invited them out and got them tickets. Cause those guys have been my guys since college and through my NFL career. So, wow, I got to celebrate with them after the game, which was awesome. They were so pumped for me, and a couple of them were Eagles fans so that made them extra pumped.
