DaytonDailyNews.com

CINCINNATI — Corey Mays is now 1-for-2 when it comes to close shaves.

"My last haircut?" the Cincinnati Bengals linebacker out of Notre Dame said as he repeated the question with a smile and that thatch of long dreadlocks that are tied ponytail-style and hang half way down his back.

"Freshman year in college, a bunch of seniors came into my dorm room the first night of training camp and they shaved me bald 'cept for a couple of bad designs they put in there... It was terrible."

Did he try to fend off those guys that August night in 2001?

"I had to make a decision whether to fight seven or eight people or just get my hair cut," he said. "I took the cut."

He faced another close-shave situation in the third quarter of the Bengals game with Washington, Sunday, Dec. 14 at Paul Brown Stadium and this time with those unshorn braids cascading out the back of his helmet — "they give me strength, like Samson," he grinned — he chose to fight.

The Redskins — who trailed, 17-10 — were just inches away from tying the game. On second and goal from inside the one yard line, they handed the ball to 280-pound fullback Mike Sellers, who tried to roll over Mays into the end zone. One game official signalled a touchdown, but the Bengals challenged and upon review, the call was reversed. Mays had stopped him short.

That brought third down and Mays suddenly remembered something middle linebacker Dhani Jones — the team's resident deep thinker — had kept saying during the week.

"He kept talking about the three Cs — challenges, choices and chances," Mays said. "About how in life you have obstacles and you just keep fighting ... Ask him about it. It was kind of beautiful to me. Poetic."

A few dressing stalls away, Jones shrugged:

"When you're 1-11-1 and people lose faith on the outside, you have to build faith on the inside ... Sometimes I listen to the voices in my head and just blurt things out.

"Choices, challenges, chances — it becomes a mantra. And today Corey took that chance."

On third down, Washington again gave the ball to the Sellers and he tried diving over the pile, only to be met in midair by Mays and fellow linebacker Brandon Johnson.

Still churning, Sellers then made a second effort.

"I thought he might try to get out to the edge," Mays said. "It happened to us in college when we played USC and we had (Trojan quarterback) Matt Leinart stopped. But he got to the edge, had Reggie (Bush) behind him pushing and he got in the end zone to beat us (34-31) on the final play. So this time I was ready for whatever came."

Sellers made his second surge, but just before he crossed the goal line, Mays knocked the ball out of his hands and recovered it in the end zone for a touchback.

"Everybody was just swiping at the ball and all of a sudden I see it there like a big piece of candy," Mays said, "Next thing I'm going, 'Aaaahh I got the ball.... I got the ball!"

That preserved the margin in what would end up a 20-13 Bengal victory — just the second of the year for Cincinnati.

"That was the play of the game," Brandon Johnson said with a bit of teasing exaltation. "Without Corey, we wouldn't have won today. This is Corey Mays' day and tomorrow we're having a parade."

A few feet away, Mays just laughed and shook his head and that big bunch of braids flopped back and forth, the perfect adornment for this closest-of-shaves victory.