Archbishop Ryan’s Stanley Montgomery is a three-sport star. One life-changing moment put it all in perspective.

Stanley Montgomery can talk about it now, the day he will never forget and how he uses that tragic moment that changed his life as energy that is changing his.

Archbishop Ryan’s Penn State-bound defensive tackle, at 6-foot-3, 290 pounds, is a little larger than he was as a sophomore on the brink of turning 15. Saturday, Jan. 6, 2025, seemed like any normal winter day, which he filled playing video games. The next thing he knew, he dozed off with the video controller in his lap.

Upon waking up, his life changed forever.

“I called up to my mom and didn’t hear anything,” he recalled. “I woke up from a nap, and I remember calling up to her again. I still didn’t hear anything. I had no calls or text from her. That’s when I ran up to see her in her bed. My dad was at work. I saw my mom and shook her. She didn’t move. I flipped out. I was crying, calling my dad and yelling. He told me to call 911.”

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Kaofi Montgomery had died in her sleep from a pulmonary embolism, a medical condition that occurs when a blood clot travels through the bloodstream and blocks an artery in the lungs. She was 47 years old.

Throughout her life, Kaofi had been battling blood clots, often taken to the hospital when Stan was in his formative years.

For weeks after, Stan wasn’t able to sleep. He wasn’t able to go back home. He lived with his older sister for a while. For months, he blamed himself.

Every time he steps on a football field, he thinks about his mother. Before each game, he takes a look at a photograph of the two of them inside a pendant.

“I feel her presence every time I wrestle or play football, especially during the hard times, because it can’t get any worse than what I went through [on Jan. 6, 2025],” said Montgomery, 17, who carries a 3.7 grade point average. “I’ll never forget it. I can’t. There were some dark times. I blamed myself. I was mad at myself, because I could have been with her more, but she wanted me to be more involved with athletics, and I had to take what she wanted for me and turn it into something.

“But in the way I see it, I wouldn’t be where I am now if that didn’t happen. I can’t change what happened. I can change where I was going.”

Montgomery originally committed to Syracuse after his sophomore year. Former Penn State coach James Franklin had shown interest in Montgomery, and he tried to get Montgomery to change his mind. But Franklin never followed through with a scholarship offer, Montgomery said. New Penn State coach Matt Campbell came in with renewed interest and extended an offer to Montgomery last January.

He committed on April 30 to Nittany Lions defensive line coach Ikaika Malloe.

Much of the credit goes to Montgomery. He transformed himself. He started playing football when he was 8 but he was reluctant to wrestle, despite the urging of his father, Stanley Montgomery Sr., who wrestled and played football at Northeast High.

The younger Montgomery did not pick up wrestling until midway through his freshman year, when he went 9-3, having to cut down from 330 pounds to 285. His sophomore year he made a leap going 26-14, and by his junior year, he finished No. 2 in the Catholic League and 36-7 overall, reaching the regional quarterfinals.

He also found a correlation between wrestling and football. His cardiovascular endurance evolved dramatically, and his footwork progressed tremendously. Montgomery found himself in an unusual position in the age of specialization for major high school athletes, and that’s as a standout in three sports (he also competes in discus and shot put for the track team).

He says he would not have wound up at Penn State if he had not taken up wrestling.

Mark Ostaszewski, Ryan’s football coach, is certainly happy Montgomery found his way to the wrestling mats.

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“We knew Stan’s potential as a freshman,” Ostaszewski said. “You saw moments when Stan would dominate, a little here and a little there. But he didn’t really take off until his junior year. That’s when it began to sink in that Stan was something special. The major schools began coming out and looking at him. He began dominating games. You knew Stan was on the field every time he played. This year, he holds everyone accountable. He commands everything.

“Athletes like Stan do not exist anymore in three sports, as a shot putter, wrestler, and football player. He was a 319-pound eighth grader. His father and us pushed him to wrestle and he immediately lost 30 pounds. He never missed a lift. His discipline and the way he carries himself, you knew he was going to be good.”

During the spring, Montgomery would lift with the football team, go to track practice, and then go back and lift again. His nonstop attitude has been contagious on the football team, and he’s been an inspiration to the athletes in his other sports as well. As a junior, he power cleaned 315 pounds, squatted 600 pounds, and does 315 pounds twice on the incline bench, which translates to 350 pounds or more for a flat bench press lift.

Montgomery has the kind of mindset, Ostaszewski said, to do anything he sets his mind to. Unfortunately for Ryan, because he will be attending Penn State in January, he will not be wrestling his senior high school season.

Ryan is 1-6 after getting off to a 0-3 start with Montgomery sidelined until the fourth game. Montgomery was out due to back surgery over the summer, which slowed down his offseason conditioning.

“It was frustrating this year returning from the back surgery in the summer,” Montgomery said. “... It was hard watching the [first three] games. Coach wanted me to start, so I didn’t play defense my first game back [in a 46-0 Ryan victory over Lansdale Catholic on Sept. 19]. It didn’t mean I was going to sit back. If I saw something on defense, I would let our guys know it.”

As a junior, he had 44 total tackles, 19 tackles for loss, and 8½ sacks for minus-84 yards. So far this season, in one game on defense, he has one sack.

“I look back at everything that happened to me, finding my mom and all, maybe I better start taking more stock in myself,” Montgomery said. “I still have some tough times ahead. I know it will hit me, because my mom won’t be there for Parents’ Day at Ryan. I’m leaving for Penn State early, and she won’t be there to see me off to college or be there when I’m in my cap and gown when I graduate. Those times will be challenging to get through. But I think she would like everything that has happened to me.

“I don’t blame myself anymore. Football and my family helped me get over that. I know I carry her with me everywhere I go — the classroom, the weight room, the football field. She’ll always be with me.”