Tears filled every eye in the room as four teenage boys took turns holding the baby on their laps.

The four were boys only in terms of age, though. Outwardly they looked like men -- tough, strong-looking men -- each weighing over 200 pounds and standing over 6-feet tall.

And watching them was a woman who, only seconds earlier, had become a mother to the four-month-old baby boy the Shaw brothers kissed goodbye.

Then, came the tears that Tim Shaw and his brothers -- Steve, Peter and Andrew -- could not hold back. They were a mixture of happiness and sadness because the Shaw boys knew what this goodbye meant.

It meant that the foster child, who their family had loved for the four months since his birth, had found a good home for the rest of his life, but it also meant that they had to let go of this child to which they had become very attached.

None of the boys wanted to be there for that moment; they thought it would be too hard to let go.

No, they were there because their mother had insisted. "I want the new family to see the baby was loved," she said, "not just cared for."

But it was moments like this that have made Shaw, Penn State's starting middle linebacker, the person he is today.

"Here are these four hulking teenage boys sitting there with tears running down their cheeks, kissing the baby goodbye," Shaw's mother Sharon remembered.

Of course, this is only one moment -- and one foster child in Shaw's senior year of high school -- that stands out in a unique upbringing for Shaw.

Over a period of 13 years, starting when Tim was in first grade, the Shaws have taken 34 foster children into their home while collaborating with a Detroit-based adoption agency. The Shaws have had their current foster child, Parker, since the beginning of last summer.

And it must have seemed as though children were always coming and going in the Shaw house as Tim grew up. The lessons Tim and his brothers learned along the way probably sound obvious and overused, but those who know Shaw say they really are apparent in the 6-foot-1, 230-pound redshirt sophomore linebacker.

Things like responsibility and work ethic and selflessness, learned easily in a childhood spent helping to take care of infants.

And then, there is also the sense of compassion that explains how one special foster child can move four rugged teenage boys to such emotion.

"I loved seeing that," Sharon said. "I think that is a really important part of their character."

*****

Several imposing men -- football players, all of them -- filed into a postgame interview room. Many of them were quiet after a 16-3 loss to Wisconsin on Saturday, but Tim Shaw was angry and upset.

He's still the nice guy that he always is, but the nice guy is nice to others mostly. The nice guy is very hard on himself and avoids excuses.

Even when it comes to the excuse of youth, a common cop-out many have used to explain the struggles of the current group of Nittany Lions.

"We're tired of being young," Shaw said. "I'm not young anymore. I've played three games, four games. Forget about being young."

The accountability Shaw took for the loss was striking because, looking at the stat sheet, Shaw appeared to have the best game of his career as a college linebacker. He had 10 tackles (six solo) and one pass break-up.

But the way Shaw saw it, those tackles could have been for a loss, and that pass break up could have been an interception.

"We gotta keep stepping up," he said. "And for me, that's getting off blocks. I got blocked way too much tonight."

A reaction like this isn't surprising to his roommate, defensive end Tamba Hali.

"If he doesn't accomplish his goals, that's a major thing for him," Hali said. "If he had a chance to be a difference makers in the game and the opportunity came and he didn't get it, that would be a reason to be upset with himself."

And this shouldn't be surprising at all coming from an athlete who was dissatisfied with only winning the state high school championship in the 100-meter dash. He wanted to win the 200 and the long jump, too.

He pushed himself that way the entire time he was at Clarenceville High School, a small school district in the suburbs of Detroit. For a school that graduates less than 150 student a year, Shaw was a once-in-a-lifetime athlete.

After he had set the Michigan state record for career rushing yards in his senior year, he moved on to basketball and, then, track in the spring. All this while maintaining a 3.8 grade point average.

"For as good as he was, he could have been cocky, but he wasn't," said Dean Bergeron, Shaw's high school track coach. "I don't think I'll ever have another student athlete like him."

And always he was a leader, the one superlative kid in a small town who, as a child, "everyone on the playground wanted to have him on [his or her] team," his father, John, said.

He embraced his niche as a leader, reluctantly at first, but as he matured, he became confident. And when Shaw talked, his fellow high school teammates listened. He knew how to make them listen.

His high school football coach, Greg Hudkins, remembers a practice during Shaw's senior year when the team wasn't hustling. Shaw decided to give them motivation to pick up their play saying "the next person I see walking gets laid out."

And the walking by Shaw's mostly 180-some-pound teammates suddenly stopped.

While that may sound like brutal retribution, it was merely Shaw acting as the leader he knew he had to be. When any practice broke, he was the nice guy again.

And if it was a break between two-a-day practices, the mom of the nice guy was usually waiting with a cooler full of Popsicle's for every member of the team.

After all, he must have gotten it from some where.

*****

A large group of high school students clamored with trays and silverware as they sat down to eat at a Ponderosa's in the Detroit area.

They could be heard as they got off the bus, and smaller tables were no doubt pushed into a larger seating arrangement to accommodate the 14 members of the Clarenceville High School track and field team.

They were on their return trip from a track meet where their top senior runner and jumper, Shaw, had, yet again, dominated several events. Still, they were drained by the rigors of participating in a track meet with such a small team, and they were hungry.

Every member of the team quickly dived into his meal, except for one: Justin Brown, a freshman on the team who participated despite his cerebral palsy.

He was someone everyone on the team often took a special interest in helping. When Brown ran the 800, the team would often make an extra effort to encourage him. But, of course, it's always remembered a little more keenly when Shaw, the star athlete, is the one humbling himself to do it.

"Here is a kid running in the state final, encouraging a kid who can barely make it around the track," Sharon said.

Brown, at that moment in the restaurant, was not devouring his meal like his teammate. The unsteady hands that he had because of his nervous disorder made cutting his meat difficult, and, soon, Shaw was by his side cutting it for him.

Shaw, his family said, never would have wanted excess credit for this. He was just the one teammate who happened to help Brown. It's what any teammate would have done, what any good person would have done.

The John Hughes movie stereotype of small-town high school jock wouldn't do this, though.

But it seems that Shaw never was the one to do what you'd expect.