PULLMAN -- This is the book on Travis Long: rock-solid student, high-achieving football player, and a superlative waiting to happen as a person. You know, the kind of guy you would want calling your daughter, etc.

What he isn't, is very talkative. He's outspoken, all right, outspoken by just about everybody else.

So this was the scene on Christmas Day 2008, at the home of Chris Ball, Washington State's defensive coordinator: The family is opening presents, and the phone rings.

Ball's wife, Tandi, shoots him a dirty look, but the caller ID says it's Travis Long and she says, "You better take it."

Long was one of the perceived cornerstones of WSU's rebuilding process, a player who had scholarship offers from Boise State and Oregon State. Washington's new staff made a late pitch as well.

The antithesis of flamboyant, Long picked Christmas Day to tell Ball he was committing to the Cougars.

"I don't know," Long shrugged recently. "I just felt like I was ready."

"I said, 'Thank you, Santa Claus, that's exactly what I was wishing for,' " Ball recalled. "It was a first, in 25 years of coaching."

Coming up on three years later, Long is about to enter his junior season at WSU, and there's reason to think it'll be a big one for him.

First, there's this reality: The Cougars have been so lacking in victories that their premier players tend to be obscured by the losing. Long, a defensive end, is clearly one of those, having recorded five sacks and 10 tackles for loss in 2010, numbers that were just outside the top 10 in the conference.

Moreover, he did it packing a bad shoulder. Early in fall camp, he was doing a "swim" move over an offensive tackle when the shoulder got forced out of its socket temporarily.

"From then on," Long said, "it happened about every day."

There was talk about surgery, he said, "but at that point, I didn't want to not play. I figured if they needed me, I probably should play through it."

It became almost a ritual of practice. When Long’s shoulder would fail him, he would head to the sideline and return to the field five minutes later.

“It was gut-wrenching to watch him go through what he did last year,” Ball said. “He never complained. He never shut it down. There were days when I could tell he was really hurting.

“You talk about being tough and playing with pain, going the distance for this football team ... he did that last year.”

Long had surgery in late December and missed parts of winter conditioning and spring ball. He’s fit again, and his coaches believe that not only is a healthy Long big for their defense, but the example he set last year played well with his teammates.

A tweak in scheme also should facilitate his pass rush. The Cougars have switched Long primarily to the defensive right side, where he won’t face a tight end as often.

“He didn’t go through spring ball, but he’s taken a tremendous amount of reps his first two years,” WSU coach Paul Wulff said. “I think he’ll come back well.”

The son of Navy parents, Long grew up in Spokane, attended Gonzaga Prep, took advanced placement classes and piled up a 3.97 grade-point average. After Long chose the Cougars, his coach, Dave McKenna, told The Seattle Times: “He’s truly the all-around package. I have a daughter, and he’s the guy you want her to date.”

That assessment isn’t at odds with that of Ball, who said: “I’ve got a son, and if he grows up like Travis Long, it means I’ve done well as a father.”

A 24-game starter in two seasons, Long is more apt to set the bar with his motor than his mouth. WSU coaches told him they wanted to build with guys like Long, and he hasn’t failed them, even as the Cougars have won a mere three games in his two seasons.

“I still understand it’s a process,” he said.

He understands something else about finally seeing some fruits of that process.

“It’s just time,” he said.

That’s what he concluded the day he decided to join the program.