As the sun sets over Rhodes Field, the light shines down so the figures running across the grass can barely be seen through the glare.
But if you squint hard enough, Fikile Richard Brushett's image comes through as he fights with teammate John Rhodes for possession of the ball. Brushett steps in front of him fearlessly, swinging his arms around, showing intense aggressiveness even in practice.
He has a broken arm.
"My lip was totally bruised after" the run-in with Brushett's cast, said Rhodes, a sophomore midfielder and one of Penn's more muscular players.
"He is a very physical and aggressive player even with the cast," Rhodes said.
Brushett, a sophomore, was injured in the first preseason game this year, and it will be months before his arm fully recovers.
Obviously Brushett never heard the news. He is currently playing at the highest level of his career having notched one goal and one assist against Temple and La Salle two weeks ago -- and he was robbed of another goal by the officials last week against Cornell. This comes after scoring just one goal his entire freshman year.
Brushett has established himself as one of the more athletic players on the team.
"He is in excellent shape... definitely has a lot of athletic ability," said sophomore defender Justin Estrada, one of his better friends on the team.
"God has really blessed him in that area."
Brushett's blessed gifts almost went unnoticed, as he was not scouted by colleges until the fall of his senior year.
Brushett was a senior at St. Andrew's High School in Montgomery County, Md., a school not exactly known as a breeding ground for soccer superstars.
"I could pass the ball, but the chances of the kid doing anything with it were pretty small," Brushett said.
Penn coach Rudy Fuller saw Brushett play in fall tournaments with his club team and said he was "an exceptional athlete and just got better and better on the soccer side every time I saw him, so we pursued him."
And Penn wasn't the only one to do so. After Brushett switched to a more prominent club team, he also saw attention from UNC-Chapel Hill, Wake Forest, Northwestern and American.
"He is a very good student athlete, and was interested in a good combination of academics and athletics," Fuller said. "I think we had the best combination for him."
"I could go to some amazingly powerful athletic programs, but at the same time they didn't have the major I was interested in," Brushett said.
"Also, I could have gotten injured the first practice and had it been career-ending, and then where am I at that point.... It just felt right to choose Penn."
The major is chemical and biomolecular engineering, for which he found inspiration in the place he least expected it.
"I saw The Rock when I was 14," Brushett said. "I loved every minute of it.... [Nicholas Cage] was a chemist, but I like math a lot, so adding math to that would make a chemical engineer.... It was on a whim, but it was the right movie at the right time."
In his first year at Penn, Brushett's athletic ability was exploited up front as a forward whose main goal was to tire defenders to open up more opportunities for the veteran players.
"I did a lot of the horse work up front," Brushett said. "I would give the defenders a run-around and make the defense really uncomfortable and utilize my athletic ability to get behind them and get something started.
While Brushett certainly contributed to the Quakers' Ivy League championship season in his first year, it was obvious he had not yet reached his full potential.
"He needed a lot of work on the technical side," Fuller said. "He's still improving, but the difference between when he first walked in the door last year and now is night and day."
This improvement in tactical skill has earned Brushett the position of flank midfielder, which brings more responsibility.
"He's learning how to get himself in good spots when he's on the field," Fuller said. "As he got better technically, we've been able to take advantage of his athletic ability and put him out as a wide midfielder."
"He is creating a lot of chances offensively and also has defensive responsibilities," Estrada said. "His fitness allows him to do both."
It could be argued that it was his intensity that got him his broken arm.
While chasing after freshman Ryan Tracy, Brushett was holding him up, and the two fell to the ground.
"They say I tripped him, I think he just fell over," Brushett said. "My arm was underneath him, so he went pretty much clean through."
"He was fortunate it was a pretty clean break," Fuller said.
Brushett continued to play with casts of all sizes and weights, but as the casts have shrunk, his play has improved.
"Having a big cast on throws off your balance and there is an adjustment to it, but he worked very hard," Fuller said. "As soon as he got that first cast, he wanted to pad it up and be out there playing."
While Fuller can count on Brushett for intensity, Brushett can count on his teammates for some light teasing about his injury.
"There was a lot of talk about just sawing [my arm] off before games so I could play," Brushett said. "But they make fun of me because they love me. I already tell so many jokes that people don't make too much fun of me because they know I'd come back at them."
While his wit may be active on the bus or in the locker room, Brushett employs a different leadership tactic on the field.
"Rich shows leadership more by example," Rhodes said.
"Talk is cheap, he lets his playing do the talking," Estrada said.
"He just plays hard and works hard.... There is no timidity in his style since he's gotten that cast."
And it is the intense playing style that pushes Brushett to risk his weak arm to take out an opponent -- even in practice -- after an injury which would force many players to the bench.
