Year 1: Middle-aged women and The Dump

My first season in the college basketball world went very well. The Akron Zips finished 23-13, winning the MAC tournament, advancing to the NCAA Tournament in Chicago. The Zips ultimately lost to Notre Dame in the first round, but made a great showing, especially for a 15 seed. This makes 6 seasons in a row where the Zips have won 20+ games, as well as the fifth season in a row reaching the conference championship game (a feat only Butler and Gonzaga can also claim).

I spent the year as a volunteer assistant. No financial help from the school, a whole lot of burden on the parents. I took a second job on the side as a barback at a local bar that doubled as a catering company to the university. I spent my mornings in practice; my afternoons spent making sure players were in class. My nights were spent loading and unloading kegs, changing taps, taking out the garbage, and the worst part: getting hit on by drunk middle-aged women. Don't get me wrong, I'm not jaded to the notion of getting hit on, but when the pick-up line comes out of the mouth of a middle-aged woman and it involves "taking out THEIR 'trash'" and making sure I get proper "payment," the whole song-and-dance gets old.

Side Note: I've long wondered about the thought process in a pick-up line. Does it always need to be work-related? Will someone come up to me someday and ask to "coach" my "team" to a "championship"...? Can we just make an agreement, ladies of the world, if you wanna throw a pick-up line my way, that it not involve my occupation? In return, I promise I won't ask to flame-broil your burger...if ya know what I mean...

I didn't realize, until 3 months into the second job, that I was supposed to be getting tips (outside from the drunkies wanting to "tap my keg") from the bartenders. I estimated the loss to be around $300...bummer.

I had a third job...unofficially, that is. I was placed in a home with a kid we had recruited but was a non-qualifier and had to sit out his freshman season. My job was to keep him out of trouble and get him to class...make him eligible. He is an enormously talented kid, a Big East-caliber talent. But he only does things on "his" terms and if your agenda doesn't fall in line with "his" terms, then you're just out of luck.

I use quotations around "his" because many times "his" terms were not even that of his own, but an ever-changing mix of the girl he wanted to be with, his buddies from home, his new-found Akron friends, and sometimes the Akron staff....sometimes.

I thought I could balance all three jobs, but as the year went on and the season picked up, my roommate began to miss more and more classes. I couldn't leave him alone, he needed to get to his late classes. I couldn't carry all three jobs. I tried to reason my way through the problem. I didn't come to Akron to be a barback, the only paying job I had had to go...

The place we lived was a dump...

On the first day we arrived, we got a pamphlet from the landlord stating the house was filled with lead paint, and we couldn't sue if we ingested said paint. Way to set the tone...There was no living room. I had to donate my couch to a friend-of-a-friend because the doorways were too narrow to bring it in. No air conditioning. The bathroom had a peep-hole (presumably carved by middle-aged patrons of the bar). The stove stayed on the entire time we lived there, impossible to shut off, it was never used. The longest hallway was 7 feet long and just under 2 and a half feet wide. Our neighbor across from us committed suicide halfway through the year. The steps might as well have been a slip-n-slide in the winter. We had to carry our clothes outside, in the snow, to the basement, in order to do laundry. My roommate fell through the steps when one of the steps collapsed.

Fortunately for me, the people I worked with were as good as my house was bad. Genuinely good people, and a whole lot of basketball knowledge to learn from them...