RIGHT ON TIME

Fourteen months after a devastating knee injury, Lake Bluff’s Rylie Mills recorded his first NFL sack in the biggest game of them all—and reminded everyone why nobody ever doubted he’d make it back.

EDDIE SCHEIDLER WAS SUPPOSED TO BE ASLEEP. Instead, the former Lake Forest High School (LFHS) and Notre Dame football player was propped up in bed on Super Bowl Sunday, laptop open, trying to squeeze in a few more minutes of football before a 1 a.m. wake-up call for work.

Then he saw a Seattle Seahawk chase down New England quarterback Drake Maye.

“Wait,” Scheidler remembers thinking. “Was that Mills?”

A second later came the celebration. No doubt about it.

“I knew it was Rylie as soon as he started celebrating,” says Scheidler, who works for NBC Sports Group in Stamford, Connecticut. “So now I’m thinking, ‘I chummed up with a guy in high school who just sacked Drake Maye.'”

Not a bad way to stay awake. Not a bad way for Rylie Mills to record the first sack of his NFL career, either.

The 2020 LFHS graduate and Seattle Seahawks rookie defensive lineman needed only five snaps in Super Bowl LX last February to make a lasting impression, dropping Maye in the second quarter of Seattle’s 29-13 victory over New England.

The moment was memorable on its own. The road to it made it remarkable.

Just 14 months earlier, Mills was on the ground at Notre Dame after suffering multiple torn ligaments in his right knee while recording a sack in a College Football Playoff game. Surgery followed. So did months of crutches, rehabilitation, and uncertainty.

“Long road to recovery,” Mills says. “I’d spend six, seven hours a day doing what I could to strengthen the knee.”

Others never questioned how the story would end.

“Knowing him, there was never a question of whether he would be back,” says LFHS football coach Chuck Spagnoli. “It was a matter of when. He is a very motivated and competitive person.”

The comeback looked quick from the outside. Spagnoli laughs at that notion.

“I’m sure the only people who think his recovery was quick are those who did not do the rehab with him,” he says. “For him, there was nothing quick about it.”

Nothing easy, either. But difficult has never scared Mills.

At LFHS, opponents regularly devoted extra blockers to slowing him down. It rarely worked.

“Rylie got quadruple-teamed in games and still made big plays,” Scheidler says.

Spagnoli remembers more than sacks and tackles.

“Rylie was a tremendous worker and leader,” he says. “His mental toughness and work ethic were exemplary. He was as great a teammate as he was a player.”

Mills carried those traits to Notre Dame, where he developed into one of the nation’s top defensive linemen, finished ninth in school history with 17 career sacks, earned All-America honors, and served as a team captain.

“Big, funny, goofy kid,” Scheidler says. “Then he became one of the top defensive linemen in the country.”

The Seahawks selected Mills in the fifth round of the 2025 NFL Draft despite the knee injury. Seattle believed the player would return.

Mills believed it, too. Before the Super Bowl, he tried to keep things simple.

“Don’t think, just play, and go hard,” he told himself.

On his second snap of the game, he did exactly that. He fought through a block, pursued Maye and finished the play 10 yards behind the line of scrimmage.

The television cameras caught the sack. They missed what happened next.

“My teammates were smacking my helmet several times while we celebrated on the sideline,” Mills says.

He welcomed every one of those blows. They were reminders of how far he had come.

Seattle’s championship parade, postgame celebrations, and a victory trip to Cancun followed. Eventually came the offseason and the reality that Year 2 is approaching fast.

Mills knows NFL depth charts are earned, not gifted. Training camp awaits. So does another opportunity.

The confidence gained from proving he belongs surely doesn’t hurt. Neither does knowing he has already delivered under football’s brightest lights.

These days, Mills still talks fondly about one of his favorite hometown meals: an Italian beef, no peppers, and a Diet Coke from Bluffington’s Café.

Maybe someday the restaurant names a sandwich after him. If not, that’s OK.

Rylie Mills already has something far more difficult to earn. A place in Super Bowl history.