IN THE BEGINNING

This blog is meant to show you the life of junior Sean Sweeney a walk on basketball player and freshmen Glenn Self. We both play at Charleston Southern University, well actually we both sit on the bench for Charleston southern. This year the season is not going as anticipated were are 5-10. We will recap the season in a minute, but so far this year Glenn and I have not missed a single shot in a game. True we haven’t been on the floor for even a second nor taken one shot this year,but we like to find the positives during this long grueling season. Sean hasn’t played yet this year due to transferring from a Division 3 school and has to sit out. Dumb because no one in the Big South could care if he plays and no one back at the division 3 school could care either, just another dumb NCAA rule. Glenn is sitting out this year due to a subluxation of his shoulder (basically he dislocated it) suffered during a pre season drill called “four man war”. The injury was not able to be fixed through rehabilitation, therefore he underwent surgery early November, giving him his “redshirt year”.


For all six of you reading this, it’s now Sean Sweeney and I am going to tell you about the blog, about my story and how I got to Charleston Southern University. First the blog was inspired by mark Titus. (shout out club trillion) Glenn and I began reading his blog a few weeks ago and he’s just hilarious, we in no way shape or form hope or anticipate being as funny as his blog but this is our story. Nor do we anticipate it being as popular because we sit at Charleston Southern and Mark Titus sits at the Ohio State University. My dream to be a division one player basically started after watching my cousin play at South Carolina (Chuck Eidson). Ever since then I have wanted to be involved with a division 1 basketball program. I played two years at a Division 3 school and I wasn’t a standout player just did my role made open shots, rebounded and hustled. This summer I was given the opportunity to be a walk on player at Charleston Southern and I jumped. I thought that I was just going to cruise on through after talking to other walk-ons at various schools who said most of the time they don’t even practice they just keep stats. Not many people talked about the 6 am lifting or the 6 am running at the track but most people are rewarded by playing time but walk-ons reward's comes in practice when no one is around. Needless to say this year our team along with not winning as much as we would like, have been killed by injuries. We have 2 players out for the year and a big man who just broke his arm. Thus making me the number ten player at practice meaning I get every rep of every practice. I went from being a role player who subbed to give guys a break to be the superstar and by superstar I mean the 10th player so we can scrimmage 5 on 5. We wish we would have started this blog earlier with all of the funny things that have happened but we are both procrastinators. Oh well, better late than never. During this blog I am going to keep a running count of all scholarship players that I beat in horse with my nasty left handed shot and super wet nothing but net shots. To date Austin Johnson BEAT. Geidrus Knysas BEAT, Tovi Bailey (starter) BEAT. So that’s three and now I will be challenging every player, yes I will even go after Ja’marco Warren after lots of practice.


For my parents and fellow relatives whom I have now informed of the blog, this is Glenn Self telling his side of the story. Now I’m sure you’re wondering how a 6’0 162 lb. Caucasian guard made it to the division 1 level on a scholarship. Quite frankly I ask myself that question every night in bed while either my shoulder is throbbing or in fear of the 7am individual workout that I will be taking part of in the morning. I guess you could say I was somewhat of a standout in high school in West Virginia, but that’s not saying much. I was enrolled at High Point University (also in the Big South) as a regular student with some aspirations of walking on but not very serious about it. Then during an AAU tournament in my home state of West Virginia, Charleston Southern apparently liked my game and offered me a scholarship. I simply couldn’t pass up an opportunity like this. Maybe it was my super wet jumper or my sick handles or possibly my intimidating stature. Who knows, all I know is that I’m here at Charleston Southern and it has been quite the experience. During a fall workout we were doing a drill called “four man war” which consists of a coach throwing a ball at the basket and the four players try to score in the paint for the next four minutes. The catch is there are no fouls and the losers have to run (this creates immense amounts of competitiveness) and needless to say, I tried to grab a rebound and my arm was pulled out of socket (resulting in unbelievable amounts of pain and a dislocation) and sadly put me on the bench right next to Sweeney for the rest of the season. Hopefully this blog will give you a better understanding of the life of division 1 athletes that may not get on the court, but still do their part to make the team go.


Also if anything happens on the road this year Glenn will be reporting because not only do I not dress with the team, I do not travel with the team either. One disadvantage of not traveling resulted in me staying in the dorms over Christmas break alone with only the security guards being here. Luckily I stayed in Glenn’s room because he would leave me the key so I would have access to the Xbox 360 and a super sick TV. The all time low in my short walk on career was when we played Covenant College at home on the 13th of December and Coach Powell (a former Clemson walk on) told me I could go home after the game. I had my bags packed, my pillow and tooth brush in the car ready to go. As I was walking out Coach Powell informed me that I would have to wait until Tuesday for practice in case someone got hurt they would need me as the 10th player. Crushed by this I went to Coach Radebaugh the next day and asked him if I could leave right after the game Monday night. Me thinking I could get a head start, I left at 6 p.m. while the team was in Cincinnati and drove for three and a half hours. I then received the dreaded text message from Glenn (who travels) informing me that Jamarco turned his ankle in the last minute of the game. Thinking he was joking I laughed it off, I then received a phone call from Coach Powell who told me that I had to be at practice the next day then I could go home. That three and a half hr drive back to Charleston was one of the most demoralizing drives of my life. Mainly because I was playing with fire, trying to get a head start home, and I got burned. I went to the hour and a half practice the next day. Yes an hour and a half practice, then got in the car and drove ten hours back to Philadelphia.

P.S. Sean Sweeney will never defeat all the scholarship players on the team in horse due to the fact he has to go through “the” Glenn Self.

In closing we don’t know how many blogs there will be. Hopefully it’s not a dud and someone actually reads it, enjoying it or not, and will provide us with motivation and inspiration for future posts.

Yours Truly,

S 2

(Sweeney and Self)