LYNNWOOD — To Edmonds-Woodway freshman coach Andrew Hershey, Nick Fuga-Tufono is a gifted athlete whose natural talents make him one of the better football players he’s ever coached.

To the other players on the Edmonds-Woodway and Richmond Junior Blue football teams, Nick is a respected teammate, who possesses a great sense of humor and always has a smile on his face.

To his younger brother Mose, a teammate of Nick’s on the Richmond team, Nick is a big brother, who does his best to help him out on the field.

And to most of the spectators at Nick and Mose’s games, the brothers simply are two of 11 players doing their best to help their team to a victory.

Those fans would be right.

But there is something that sets Nick and Mose Fuga-Tufono apart from their teammates, though quite a few people are unaware of it.

The two brothers both suffer from a neurological disorder of unknown origin that is gradually taking away their hearing.

Nick starting losing his hearing at the age of 2 and has about 25 to 35 percent remaining without hearing aids. He can hear at 75 percent with them.

Mose was born with hearing loss and has lost his hearing at a faster rate than his brother. He is completely deaf without hearing aids and has about 35 percent hearing with them.

Even though Nick’s loss has slowed down, doctors have told the boys’ parents, Ty Tufono and Chris Chaussee, that both Nick, 14, and Mose, 13, likely will lose all of their hearing.

Despite their sons’ handicap, Ty and Chris had few reservations in letting Nick and Mose play football. Like many teenagers, the brothers are passionate about sports.

“They’re naturally gifted athletes,” Ty said. “I guess my only concern would be with the game of football was them not hearing a play or a play changing at the last second and them not hearing that.”

So far, whatever challenges Nick and Mose have encountered, either on and off the field, have been overcome.

Nick, a freshman at Edmonds-Woodway High School, is playing for both the school’s freshman team and the Shoreline-based Richmond squad. Mose, an eighth-grader at Madrona School, plays for Richmond. Nick and Mose also enjoy basketball, baseball and track. Their older brother Tony, 17, does not suffer from the disorder and is a member of the Mountlake Terrace varsity football team.

The family lives in Lynnwood but Nick attends Edmonds-Woodway and Mose goes to Madrona because of each school’s hearing-impaired programs.

For the first time in his life, Nick has been using the services of a interpreter at practice and during games at Edmonds-Woodway. The interpreter is provided as part of the Edmonds School District’s hearing-impaired program and has been a significant help.

Nick and Mose do not wear their hearing aids during practice or games because of the potential for damage to the sensitive devices.

During practice and warmups, the interpreter stays close to the coaches and even Nick’s teammates.

“They (interpreters) do such a wonderful job describing chatter,” Hershey said. “If somebody cracks a joke, they interpret the joke … if something happens in school, they give him a real picture of what each day is like.”

The interpreters also help out during games, though their access to the field is limited.

“During games, the only time (the interpreter) can come in is when we call time out,” Nick said.

The interpreter follows the team into the locker room at halftime and at the end of the game.

Ty initially was concerned that Nick might not like having an interpreter around.

“I thought it would be embarrassing for Nick to have an interpreter out there all the time,” Ty said. “But she’s part of the team. He’s not embarrassed at all by what other people would call a disability.”

Nick, who plays halfback and middle linebacker for Edmonds-Woodway, sticks close to the quarterback so he can hear him call the play. Nick also wears an arm band that lists all the plays by number.

“I wear the arm band so that he (quarterback) tells me which number with his fingers,” Nick said. “Then I can read it and if we don’t have an arm band then he just looks straight at me first and then tells me the play and I know what I’m doing.”

Nick’s teammates help him whenever he has trouble picking up what the quarterback is saying. When playing before a large crowd, the noise from fans can sometimes make it difficult for Nick to hear the quarterback’s instructions.

“When I can’t understand the quarterback, the linemen or the wide receivers, they all help me out,” Nick said.

The only significant adjustment Hershey has had to make is relaying some of his instructions through another player when he wants Nick to do something differently.

“Instead of yelling at Nick to make the adjustment, I yell at somebody else to tell Nick to make the adjustment,” Hershey said.

Nick and Mose do not have the use of an interpreter for their Richmond games and practices because it is an out-of-pocket expense.

“If they don’t have an interpreter, it’s a lot of watching for them,” Ty said. “I have to remind coaches, ‘Please stand in front of them when you’re talking so they can read your lips.’”

Because of Mose’s significant hearing loss, he relies on Nick to help him understand what’s going on during games.

Nick generally gets the plays and then signs them in to his younger brother. The two work well together.

“I feel good because we can communicate with each other,” Mose said.

Nick’s presence made a huge difference for Mose.

“The past two years they’ve played together,” Ty said. “So it’s been a lot easier for Mose with his profound loss because he’s got his brother to ask about the plays. But when he played without (Nick), it was a lot harder.”

Ty said the coaching staffs of both teams have done a good job in dealing with her sons’ hearing impairments, though there have been occasional lapses.

During a Richmond game, an assistant coach was switching players around and forgot Mose was deaf and put him in at center.

“He didn’t realize that he couldn’t hear the quarterback,” Chris recalled with a smile. “So that lasted for a play or two.”

After playing in the shadow of his older brother, Mose came into his own this season, said Richmond coach Bill Weber. Mose scored three touchdowns in Richmond’s final regular-season game.

“This year he (Mose) actually gained enough weight where he evened out and was the exact same size as Nick,” Weber said. “He matured … he definitely moved up a notch.

“They’re solid all the way through. They kind of have the body (type) of Emmitt Smith.”

Nick is 5-foot-6 and weighs 195 pounds, while Mose is 5-7 and 198 pounds.

In many ways, sports are a way for hearing-impaired students to become socially active with the mainstream population, Chris said. He noted that academically, Nick and Mose will be separated from their peers because of their hearing-impairment.

But when they are on the field, Nick and Mose are just one of the guys.

“When people look at Nick, they don’t look at a kid who’s hard of hearing,” Hershey said. “They look at Nick the football player.”

Nick and Mose’s teammates think of them not as just football players but as leaders and players to be emulated.

Edmonds-Woodway freshman quarterback Zach Hoevner had never been around a hearing-impaired person before this year. He doesn’t consider Nick’s handicap to be much of a handicap.

The only thing Hoevner does differently is when he calls an audible at the line. He makes sure to lean back and turn his head to make sure Nick hears what he’s yelling.

Hoevner and his teammates respect Nick for what he brings to the team and have also learned a little about the human spirit in the process.

“Anything is possible,” Hoevner said. “He shows the team how he can do his stuff and he can do it well.”

Every team has a dedicated group of players who attend every practice and give it 100 percent all the time and Nick and Mose have been part of that group on every team they’ve been on, said Weber, who has coached Nick for five years and Mose for three.

“I can rely on them being there every day,” he said. “If anything, the players look up to them. They all want to be as good as them.”

Last weekend, Nick and Mose helped lead Richmond to a 19-18 victory over Ballard in the Northwest Junior Football championship game. Mose scored a touchdown in the first half and Nick ran for two in the second half.

Just as Nick and Mose did their best to help their teammates out, Ty and Chris also play a major role in supporting their sons and the entire Richmond team, Weber said.

“All the kids look up to their family,” he said. “My career wouldn’t be the same without having families like that and players like that. They helped us win the championship.”