When I was 20 years old, God blessed me with my first son. Though this was unexpected, it was with the woman of my dreams who is now my wife. This was an adverse period in my life to say the least. In an instant, I went from a student-athlete with no responsibility to anybody other than myself and, of course, my teammates to a man (truthfully still a boy at the time) who needed to find a way to provide for a family. Glory to God – it has been 6 years and my wife and I are now having our 3rd child. It took a tremendous amount of grit and determination, but we both graduated without pause in our academic curriculum. I gave up a lot in what others may consider a sacrifice. Others went out on weekends, I worked. They played videogames all Saturday, I studied. They slept in, I got up multiple times each night with my boy. This was a tremendous mental challenge at the time, but in hindsight, I would do this one thousand times over to be in the position that I am in now. One lesson I have learned throughout it all, faith and hard work never fail.

My Advice

Advice for a College Athlete:
a. The first thing I would say is to really determine in your heart if you want to continue in a sport in college. There are certainly more factors at play than just a love for the game. Sports at the university level become a business and, though there is a lot of fun, there is a lot of work as well. You must look at the forest from the trees to determine what is right for your future.

b. You absolutely can outwork 98% of the competition in your sport. Granted, try as you might, there is likely no circumstance where you or I would dunk a basketball on Shaquille O’Neal, but for every Shaq, there’s a Julian Edelman. In other words, once you’ve committed to your craft, to really be successful you must put everything you have into it because that is what the elite caliber athletes do. That’s not just outworking guys on the practice field either. You outwork them in your diet, your sleep habit, your weekends, and every other aspect of your life. Few and far between are those born so athletically gifted that they can glide their way to the pros by doing only what is required.

Advice to others on whether to attend UC:
a. This is a good one. When choosing a school, I would say one thing that is often overlooked are the post-graduate companies that attend a particular University’s career fair. This can play a pretty significant role in where you land post-graduation. Facebook doesn’t recruit at UC so if that’s where you want to work, that would make it an additional challenge to be noticed in a crowded field of applicants. I love my alma mater and would biasedly tell all who ask to apply blindly. But at the core of this advice is to think about a plan b. Think about what happens if you get 12 concussions and professional sports are no longer on the table. That was a tough reality for me, but fortunately, I was already in a program that added great career value at a University that I loved.