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Antonio Lowery was afraid of him. Lowery stole his shoe. Lowery's team soaked the field.

"That was his excuse. We used to murder his school and he told the Miami Herald it was because we wet the field," Lowery said, cutting Brown off and shaking his head. "Have you ever heard anyone use an excuse like that?"

"I didn't tell the Miami Herald that -- I told you that," Brown said, shooting daggers back at Lowery.

"He was such a crybaby in high school," Lowery said. He looked across the table at his best friend, grinned and said, "Thank goodness he's grown up."

They've both grown up. Together, down in Miami, and now here, at Rutgers. They tease each other, they support each other and when one traded in his gold teeth (Brown), the other lost his baggy pants (Lowery).

Brown played at Northwestern, Lowery at Christopher Columbus, and before that, they were teammates as little boys, on the Liberty City Optimist football team, Miami's version of Pop Warner. Brown was a star wideout, Lowery played line.

"He was too fat to be anything but a lineman," Brown said.

"Yeah, it was kind of embarrassing," Lowery said, surprisingly not disagreeing.

Lowery's a slimmed-down, solid 6-foot-2, 225-pound linebacker these days, an understudy turned underdog who still won a starting spot. He was a special teams stalwart his first two years on campus, stuck behind every-game starter Kevin Malast. Malast graduated last fall and then, just before the start of spring practice and Lowery's ostensible ascension, coach Greg Schiano moved the highly-touted Manny Abreu to the weakside.

The two battled then, did again during camp and Lowery came out on top, with Schiano picking the Miami native as the player who improved most from Week 1 to Week 2 -- and is still, as Rutgers (2-1) readies for a trip to Maryland, on that same trajectory.

"Antonio is playing with more confidence. He's playing faster," Schiano said. "And Manny is still pushing him."

Lowery freely credited Abreu, and the daily competition he gives him, with much of his success, but as he said that, Brown interrupted and said, "Antonio's worked really, really hard. He hasn't let up once."

Though he had more highlight moments than his buddy, Brown similarly waited a few years for his turn, as Kenny Britt and Tiquan Underwood were the playbook's top two targets. That pair is in the NFL now, though, and Brown's 349 receiving yards lead the team.

Brown and Lowery signed in the same recruiting class, but Lowery needed to raise his SAT score. So he stayed home, he got a job pushing carts at Target and just about every day, Brown hassled then-secondary coach and Lowery's recruiter Chris Demarest with an, "Is 'Tonio coming today?" Then Brown would call Lowery and hassle him: "Are you working out? Your head's not down, is it?"

Finally, in January, Brown got word Lowery was coming, he waited up as Lowery's flight was delayed. Sometime after midnight when Lowery got in, Brown dialed up Schiano and said Lowery had to be his roommate.

"He kicked Shamar Graves out. Can you believe it?" Lowery said, as Brown proudly nodded -- and then swore Graves was still his friend.

Three years have passed and Lowery and Brown still live together. Lowery's brother, Antwan, is a defensive tackle at Rutgers, too, but Brown still calls himself brother No. 1. Lowery's the cook -- extra sugar is the secret to his pork and beans -- and Brown does the dishes. They come home after every game, queue up the DVR and watch what just happened, critiquing each other the whole time.

"He gets on me if I drop a ball, but he gets really mad if he doesn't like the way I blocked," Brown said.

And if he makes up stories.

"That's not going to stop," Lowery said. "That's who he is."

QUICK HITS: Schiano pronounced QB Tom Savage "okay," though he wouldn't commit to starting the freshman Saturday at Maryland. Savage suffered a head injury this past weekend and Schiano said he still has to meet with the team doctor before making a final determination... Freshman corner Darrell Givens has been getting more work within Rutgers' regular rotation, but Schiano said that didn't necessarily mean the Maryland native would get to make his debut Saturday.