SALT LAKE CITY — Gaius “Keio” Vaenuku was ready to embark upon his freshman season at the University of Utah in 2013 when tragedy struck.

On July 30 of that year, a week before he was to report for the football team’s fall camp, Vaenuku, along with his former high school teammates Salesi “Leka” Uhatafe, an incoming Utah freshman, and Polo Manukainiu, an incoming Texas A&M freshman, embarked on a road trip from Utah to Euless, Texas to visit family.

En route to Texas, Uhatafe, the driver, lost control of the SUV after over correcting along a highway in New Mexico and rolled the car several times, killing Vaenuku, Manukainiu and Uhatafe’s 13-year-old brother Andrew “Lolo” Uhatafe. Uhatafe’s father, Salesi Sr., was also in the vehicle when it rolled, but survived the crash.

Uhatafe blamed himself for the tragedy and was struggling to come to grips with losing two of his family members and a best friend in an instant.

“We walk into the emergency room and we see Leka standing there and so we call out to him and he takes off running,” Vaenuku’s mother Sela recalls. “He’s running towards the door and so we’re chasing after him. We just grabbed him and held him. He kept apologizing and kept apologizing.”

Sela, who was forced to remove the emotions of her own son’s death, instantly turned her attention to that of Gaius’ childhood friend and consoled him in a time when both were left with few answers.

“You could feel the overwhelming guilt that he must have felt,” she said. “We just kept telling him how much we loved him and that none of this was his fault, that the accident was not his fault. We didn’t feel that it was his fault.”

Fault aside, the Vaenuku family no longer had their son and the University of Utah was without one of its incoming freshmen players that season.

“Everyone who knew Gaius is heartbroken today,” head coach Kyle Whittingham said shortly after learning of Vaenuku’s death. “Words cannot express our devastation over the loss of Gaius. This is a sad day not only for University of Utah football, but for everyone whose lives Gaius crossed or would have crossed but for this tragedy.”

Utah dedicated the 2013 season to Vaenuku, and the team wore special stickers on their helmets to memorialize their former teammate. On Saturday, the University of Utah will honor Vaenuku again as an honorary senior, joining the outgoing seniors that were a part of his recruiting class to Utah.

“That means a lot to us just to know that this is the school that he chose and for them to continue to pull him back in and make him part of this recruiting group, this group that he was going to be there with. It feels like a big honor for us,” Sela said. “For them to continue to highlight him just shows and expresses to us that this football team and coaches is not just a business.”

Sela said the University of Utah football program is a family and “that was the impact that my son felt when he went there.

“He felt like that was his family. They made him feel like family. We continue to feel that and have a stronger conviction that they are a family,” she added. “They still make us feel loved even though our son was never on the field with them physically.”

Defensive coordinator Morgan Scalley, who was Vaenuku’s recruiting coach and was a strong proponent of honoring the former defensive lineman, continues to have contact with the family and tries to visit them or Gaius’ grave when he’s nearby, Sela said.

“There was such a connection between him and my son, and I feel like that connection lives on,” she said. “We know that he was definitely more than just a recruiting coach trying to convince a young man to come to their school.”

Living life through Leka Uhatafe

Leka was the “shy little boy” that would come over to play at the Vaenuku house where he and Gaius would do everything together. The two would eventually play on the same team at Trinity High School, along with current Utah offensive tackle Sam Tevi.

When Gaius started getting offers from Utah, he asked the coaches to look into Uhatafe, who he said was the “best offensive linemen he ever went against.”

“If it wasn’t for Gaius, he wouldn’t be there,” Vaenuku’s father Kaliko said. “He kinda pushed the coaches to give this kid a chance. He helped him along to get to the Utes.”

Following Gaius’ death, Sela said it was a “powerful” feeling to know that it was Leka driving that day because her son had gotten him to play at Utah and now it was an opportunity for Gaius to help Leka grow after the tragedy.

While embracing Leka at the hospital the day of the accident, Sela asked her son’s best friend if he was planning on going back to school. He responded that “he didn’t know if he could do it, that if he could carry on.”

But the Vaenuku family encouraged him to go back “because every achievement that you make, everything that you do, you not only achieve it for yourself, but you’re achieving it for Gaius.”

Leka returned to Utah a day after his brothers were buried, looking for a sense of normalcy to a shaken up world. Speaking to the Deseret News in 2014, Leka said the team was a huge support and helped get him through the hard times.

“It was good just to keep my mind off of things, to focus on something else,” he said. “That really helped me through the process. They were just welcoming with open arms, joking and, you know, I didn’t want to be treated differently. I’m not here to get special treatment.”

Leka decided to redshirt that 2013 season, but later earned a starting position on the offensive line. Sela said she’s seen him grow into the man and player she hoped he'd become following that night in the hospital. She added that Leka's success has been another of their son.

“We really felt that every time we see them highlight Leka or every time we see him do something good, we feel like our son is right there with him,” she said. “We want to be there for him just to let him know that there is a greater plan out there and it isn’t what we see in front of us and it’s not on our time, but on the Lord’s time.

“A lot of times we laugh as we watch the game and say that, ‘oh, that was Keio, that was Gaius, he did that.’ ” Sela added. “I feel like his spirit is there. He’s playing alongside the team even though he’s not physically there.”

Supporting the U. and keeping the faith

The Vaenuku family continues to be a strong supporter of the Utah football team, traveling to several games each year and supporting the team from Texas. For the first three seasons since Gaius’ death, the Vaenukus went to a majority of the games, mostly to support Uhatafe and Tevi and to support the team Gaius chose.

“Whether he’s on the field or not, we’re still there and supporting him because this was the team he chose,” Sela said.

Despite losing their son, the Vaenuku’s keep a positive perspective to life and rely upon their membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as a guiding principle to help them move beyond the tragedy.

“I truly believe that if it were not for my faith, for the understanding of the Plan of Salvation, we would probably be a really big mess right now,” Sela said as she offered a small chuckle. “We would be an extreme mess.”

Sela added that she has no room to complain about her son’s death, because “before we lost our son, Heavenly Father lost his. And before we felt our suffering, he felt our suffering, so how can we question that faith or that he loves us?”

Instead, the family feels “gratitude of love” and that “Heavenly Father has a greater love and his hand is in everything that happens in our lives.”

“It doesn’t always make sense, it doesn’t always give you that feeling of happiness and joy right off the bat, but we understand it and there’s a very strong conviction of that great picture. He knows what that greater picture looks like and we only see what’s in front of us. For that purpose, we accept that Heavenly Father blessed us with 18 years and filled our life with joy.”

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