Basketball has always been my first love. Family, friends and girls will always be loved, but to me there is no other feeling than picking up a basketball, going outside and shooting the last second shot or working on your best impression of Jordan’s legendary dunks on your eight-foot rim. As a kid I would spend hours dreaming about basketball, and when I got home from school I would work on moves that I had watched from that morning’s highlights on SportsCenter. I would dream about one day making it to the North Carolina’s and the Duke’s and play for the NCAA Championship. Nothing would make me happier, than going outside, clearing my head from all problems and just playing ball.
I was awkwardly tall as a kid throughout school. At first I always believed this was a curse. Why was I a foot taller than all my friends? But, what I soon realized was that I could use this to my advantage in sports. Basketball, football, baseball and soccer were the sports I played and height was beneficial in all of them; basketball especially. When I was in middle school, basketball was a Shinkansen and I was a foreign traveler just hoping to catch a ride.
My height and skill was noticed on the court and I was contacted by an inner-city basketball team in St. Louis who had seen me play and asked to come out and play for their select basketball team, the P.A.L. (Police Athletic League) Junior Bulls. My dad took me to practice downtown and I was hit with one of the best experiences to affect my life. Here I was a shy, suburban, middle class, white, twelve year-old kid walking into a practice with all African-American kids in inner-city St. Louis. This was a whole new experience for me, not just because it was my first real select team, not just because I was the only white kid in the building, but on top of that my new coaches were big, intimidating police officers, and they were dressed as so, guns and all. Needless to say I was nervous as hell doing simple tasks such as two-lined lay-ups. After practice Officer/Coach Dace, (Head Coach/Mentor), informed my dad and I that we had a game the next night downtown and I was given my first real uniform. I’ll never forget going home and immediately putting on the extremely oversized, basic print, reversible jersey that reached my ankles. I thought it was the greatest thing ever and didn’t take it off all night, begging my parents to let me wear it to school the next day.
Game day: School couldn’t get over fast enough, thinking about the game that night was the only thing on my mind. After searching for the gym downtown with my dad for quite sometime, we quickly realized that we were in for something new. No longer were we around the Schnucks, the suburban cul-de-sacs and luxurious shopping outlets, but the broke down buildings that were boarded up and the dark corners were streetlights no longer shined. I wasn’t worried about that, it wasn’t something that really affected me, because my mind was on the game. As I walked into the gym I realized my dad and I stuck out like the Delta chapter in Animal House walking into the all black bar. All eyes felt as though they quickly shifted at us and you could hear a pin drop. Of course, this isn’t what really happened, but that feeling came over me. When the game was over and we defeated the other team by 30 points or so, I knew right away that I was blessed on being on the fastest, strongest, quickest, 12 and under boy’s team in St. Louis and East St. Louis. It was at that moment I knew I was in for a great ride.
Over those next three years, I learned a lot about a lot. I never again saw the differences in race. I was just another one of the guys. I learned about competition. I traveled and got to see the Midwest. At national tournaments after our games were over, I would look up where O.J. Mayo’s team was playing next or where Lil’ Romeo’s “ballin’” squad was playing. AAU was the greatest thing for me. I got to travel, play basketball and watch the best players play ball. In high school, I played for other teams and I would travel even further, play tougher competition and watch the best players in the world play. My favorite thing to do was to scout out the college scouts in the crowd. Who was wearing the college polo shirts and held a notepad everywhere they went? Ask anyone who has ever played AAU, there’s nothing like that atmosphere.
I have been blessed to play for great teams with great players and great coaches. At Webster Groves High School I played with guys that would go on and play in college sports. Our teams over those four years were some of the best teams to ever play in Robert’s Gym. I’m proud to say that Webster has gone nine years without losing a single conference game and I was apart of four of them. I went on to play basketball for Westminster College, a Division III team in the SLIAC conference. We played in the Historic Gym, where Sir Winston Churchill gave his famous “Iron Curtain Speech.” The program was just turning around and becoming a force to be reckoned with in the conference. In four years, I was lucky enough to become the winningest player ever at Westminster due to the fact I played with great players.
I recently graduated from Westminster and “retired” from competitive basketball. All those years putting everything I could into the sport, and now it’s over. It’s sad to think about and hard to comprehend but going to practice everyday, working out and competing is over. Basketball has given back to me everything I put into it and more. I got to learn different cultures, meet friends, watch freak athletes, travel all over the U.S. and learn what it means to lead, compete and be disciplined. I wouldn’t trade that for anything. But all this leads me to one question; what do I do now? James Naismith invented the sport of basketball with a peach basket and a few balls. He realized it was something great and at some point I bet he asked himself the same question….What do I do now?
