FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- Caleb Lomu's first trip to New England is one he will never forget.
The New England Patriots' first-round draft choice was on a red-eye flight Wednesday night into Thursday morning, and in a random occurrence, his uncle was the pilot.
So for those on American Airlines flight 2701 from Phoenix to Boston, they heard more than the standard pilot announcements before takeoff.
"He's the type of uncle who is going to embarrass you a bit," Lomu said Thursday at his official Patriots introduction. "Of course, he got on the intercom, started talking and brought me up to the front." Lomu's uncle, Curtis Tanner, had been assigned the flight just a few days before.
"He was telling everyone who I was and [how he was] a proud uncle," Lomu said, adding that he was presented with a special flight pin.
Lomu, 21, had never been to New England before, and this was the first time he had been on a flight with his uncle as the pilot. The Patriots selected Lomu 28th after he started for two years Utah.
Lomu's wife, Kitty, predicted that they would be calling New England their new home.
On the first night of the draft, family and friends gathered to celebrate Lomu, and Kitty printed out a large map of the United States that included where each team was located.
"We hung it up on the wall and everyone could get a little sticky note and put their guesses of where they thought I was going to go," Lomu said. "My wife actually chose New England. She was the only one who put her name up on the Patriots. That was a sign right there."
When Lomu was picked, the television broadcast showed a prerecorded video of him dancing, which went viral.
Lomu explained the backstory of the dance Thursday ahead of the team's three-day rookie minicamp.
"That was an interesting moment. That was at the combine, all the media stuff they were doing there. They put me up on the stage along with a lot of other people, they had all the cameras, and they said, '10 seconds, just do whatever, we're going to film you,'" Lomu said.
"So I was thinking, 'What should I do?' They said to do whatever you want. They made me do that like four different times -- walk from the back of the stage out to the front, doing the exact same thing. That moment, I hated it. But I was like, 'OK, I'm up here and going to do whatever my body tells me.' It was what I was feeling in the moment. Of course, they decided to use that as a dance they posted. ... It was not my best work, but it was something."
