Trovon Baugh is not exactly sure what the reason is.

All he knows is when he goes anywhere with his teammate, roommate, fellow offensive lineman and best friend Tree Babalade, he is always the one behind the wheel.

“Tree don’t drive,” Baugh said in a 2023 press conference. “So I’ve got to drive Tree everywhere. Me and Tree, we’re always together. He’s like a brother. Every time I talk to my mom, she’s like, ‘Where’s Tree? Where’s Tree?’ It’s just something fun to be a part of.”

He suspects it is Babalade’s Washington D.C. upbringing that does it. Big city, a lot of walking, never needed to learn to drive. This is the theory, at least, although origins of the legend are still up for grabs.

They are working on getting Babalade his license, and Baugh does not mind the driving time at all. In fact, he loves it. Anything to spend a little more time hanging out.

“With Tree, you never know what you’re going to get with him driving,” Baugh said. “Sometimes I wish I had two seat belts so I can be safe.”

Leave it to an offensive lineman to want a little more protection up front.

Nothing could have fully prepared them for the high speeds of last September in Athens, though.

Not on the roads, but in the cauldron of Sanford Stadium. After two weeks of disjointed offensive line play, South Carolina’s solution was simple. Pass the baton to the true freshmen, see what happens.

It meant Babalade and Baugh both made their first career collegiate starts in the same game, the former at left tackle and the latter at right guard. It was on the road in the SEC opener. Against the two-time defending National Champions.

Last time either of them had started a game was in high school. Every rep in practice, conversation in the recruiting process and childhood dream bubbled up to the surface at once, the ultimate example of getting thrown straight into the deep end of the pool.

“It was a lot of pressure playing against Georgia,” Babalade said. “Starting as a freshman, I was really nervous. But I felt like having someone right beside me like Trovon helped, knowing me and him are going to do the same thing.”

Both took their lumps, but they grew. One start turned into another, and another and eventually they were just starters, not freshmen. Baugh ended up an All-SEC freshman by the end of the year, something Babalade still notes and is using as motivation for 2024.

A true freshman starting at all is rare in college football, more so than ever before in the transfer portal era with the availability of experienced talent every off-season now. Doing it on the offensive line is even harder to fathom, right in the malaise of brutality on every snap. Trying to physically move bodies of players with two, three, even four more years of experience and time in a college strength program.

But two at the same time, who started charting their respective courses in the same game? They almost had no choice but to get tight with each other.

“It helped a lot,” Baugh said. “It made me feel like I wasn’t the only person out there. I feel like most times on most teams you’ll look and be like, “I’m the only freshman out there.’ But I would look across and see he was still there.”

No surprise, though.

These two were indelibly tied together long before joining the starting lineup, or even the program. They formed a bond on the recruiting trail, the type of unique friendship which spawns from two teenagers pursuing life dreams together.

They took their visits to South Carolina together. Conversations about Columbia and what life would be like once they arrived on campus were frequent, and deep. When Lonnie Teasley took over for Greg Adkins as the offensive line coach in the middle of the 2022 season, he knew the two were tied together and would be crucial parts of his first recruiting class as a full-time assistant. His first introduction to the duo was actually while he was still an analyst in April 2022, meeting both of them at the Garnet and Black game.

“He recruited us together,” Baugh said of Teasley. “Around the spring game two years ago, we both met there and he called us Frick and Frack. It really just came together from there, and he played a big part in that.”

There is a certain confidence about both. On the quieter side, but unmistakable. Baugh describes Babalade as “very mellow” outside the football building. Likewise, Babalade thinks of Baugh more as a “funny guy” than anything else.

“They’re cool people,” senior offensive lineman Jakai Moore said. “They’re funny people. Tree is a funny dude, and I love Tro. They both just love to work and love to get better at their craft.”

Funny is a rare trait to associate with offensive linemen, the engines which keep the machine of running smoothly. But nothing about this path was ever normal, anyway. Normal freshmen are not starting by week three. It is controlled certainty, enough to be the youngest person in a room, know you belong and then go prove it on Saturdays.

Looking across the line to see someone else in the same situation helped, though.

“They’re the best of buds,” Teasley said. “You see one, you’re going to see the other. They live together in an apartment. They’re always together. They kind of formed that bond in recruiting, and they kept it going.”

Together at the line of scrimmage, their room and of course, on roads all around Columbia.

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