One comment former Rhode Island center Matt Greenhalgh isstill trying to get used to hearing is "you saved my life." That's whatUCF graduate and longtime Knights season ticket holder Kenneth Nuckols tellsGreenhalgh every time he sees him.

Back in December 2010, Nuckols was diagnosed with leukemiaand his best chance of survival was to find a bone marrow donor. Nuckols andhis doctor looked at a list of bone marrow donors and Greenhalgh's name came upas a match. Nuckols had no clue at the time that Greenhalgh was an athlete inhis favorite sport, nor did Greenhalgh know how big a college football fanNuckols was.

"I had no idea. They told me it was an anonymous donation,"Greenhalgh said. "All they could do was give me his age and his illness and Isaid 'alright sign me up.'"

The former URI football player recently graduated and wasone of the many Rhode Island football players who were registered as a bonemarrow donor. The entire team decided that was something they wanted to doafter head coach Joe Trainer presented the idea to the team. Every year since2009, the team and Trainer have run a bone marrow drive, in association with "Be the Match", to try and get students to become donors.

By rules of the donor list, both Nuckols and Greenhalgh hadto wait one year after the donation was made to meet each other. Both met thispast summer over the phone and hit it off right away talking about collegefootball.

"That was probably the coolest part of the whole thing isfinding out that the guy who saved my life by giving me his bone marrow was acollege football player himself," Nuckols said. "That gives us more of aconnection with the sport."

"Once Ken called me it was unreal," Greenhalgh said. "I sawa number I don't usually see on my cell phone and I picked it up and it was Kenand we talked for about a half hour and just kept our relationship from there."

When Nuckols found out UCF was going to stay in Florida forits bowl game, he decided he would spend the money he set aside for travelexpenses on a plane ticket for Matt to fly down to Orlando for the game.

"The thought occurred to me that since Matt was graduatingmaybe he would be able to come down," Nuckols said. "Instead of me spending themoney to travel, I chose to bring him down for the game. It's just my way ofsaying 'thank you.'"

The two spent hours talking about college football duringtheir couple days at the bowl game and Greenahlgh said he enjoyed learningeverything Nuckols taught him about the Knights. Greenhalgh said he wants tocontinue to stay involved with the National Bone Marrow Foundation and wants touse his position as a former college football player to get people to donate.

In early December, Greenhalgh's brother donated his bone marrowand a total of four people from the drives he helped run have already donated.

To find out more, see the video above.