I had spotted my parents about 20 rows up at Timken Gymnasium on the campus of the College of Wooster as I was about to walk towards the end of the handshake line, one of my post game rituals, something I had done a hundred times before.
Only this time I did it with a tear in my eye. And seeing my parents made it only that much more real. This would be the last game of college basketball I would ever play.
I, Terry Licht, as a member of the Benedictine University Eagles men's basketball team had just lost to the Wooster Fighting Scots in an NCAA Division III Tournament first-round matchup in March of 2011, falling 74-68 to a team that would go on to the National Championship game.
Not only was it that we lost, we shot an abysmal 31 percent from the floor, even worse from behind the arc (20 percent), missed free throws down the stretch and we still had three shots to cut Wooster's lead to 1 in the waning moments. if ever there was a rewind button to life, that would've been the time to use it. We had it in our grasp.
So needless to say my college career still ended on a good note. We made the tournament for the first time since 2004 and took one of the best teams in the country right down to the wire.
But having basketball ripped away from me like that was a terrible feeling. Like it didn't feel real for the longest time that I wouldn't play another game.
Then came another one of the worst moments in my life.
Fast forward about six months after that day in Wooster, Ohio. I had recently started my job as a sports reporter for The Northwestern, a newspaper in Oshkosh, Wis., a job that I still currently hold.
It was November 15. It was the first game of the new DIII season and I was tabbed to go watch and report on the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh Titans take on then No. 2-ranked Augustana College (Ill.) Vikings.
This was the first college basketball game I had attended since I had stopped playing basketball and mind you I still hadn't fully realized that my playing career was done.
It wasn't hard on me until the National Anthem started playing. The Anthem had always been my way of focusing in on games since my high school playing days at Cadott, Wis., and especially true when I played at Benedictine.
The tears started coming again like they did that day in Ohio, knowing that I wasn't out on that floor playing, I was watching. Watching helplessly from the sidelines while guys my own age were still out there playing and doing the things that they loved the most. I almost couldn't handle it.
Ever since that day I've been itching to get back into the fold someway, whether it be coaching or scouting. Just something to get me back to Division III basketball.
Even though I've made my peace with not playing anymore, basketball is still one of the most important things in my life. It has always been God, family and basketball and in that order.
That is why covering basketball is the most exciting thing at my job. Problem is I don't get to cover UW-Oshkosh much due to our lack of resources at the newspaper. Most of the time I'm out covering high schools, while still fulfilling to a certain degree, still misses the spot.
This is probably due to my affinity for college basketball. I've always loved taking in college games on the TV and is one of the big reasons March is my favorite month of the year.
And playing DIII basketball opened my eyes to a whole new level of college that I hadn't really known existed until I played.
This has led to a great appreciation for the players, coaches and fans of that level of basketball. You realize that people at that level are really doing it for the love of the game. There are no fancy TV deals for these colleges. No multimillion dollar contracts for the coaches. No athletic scholarships for the players. And, yet, the basketball is still very good and played at a high level. It's truly one of the purest forms of the sport that I so dearly love.
But it's sad to see that this group of basketball players goes largely unnoticed. D3hoops.com does their very best to try and put DIII basketball on a bigger stage but other media outlets do mediocre to poor jobs at covering their local small colleges, especially those in big cities like Chicago or Minneapolis or New York.
Which is why, when a friend from college who is currently an assistant coach at the DIII level (and you know who you are) came to me with idea of blogging about DIII hoops, I jumped at the idea.
His concept was a simple one and one that I could facilitate easily with my availability on weekends and with only a small financial hit -- take the DIII conferences around you and blog about them.
So that's what I've decided to do. I will take the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, the Midwest Conference and the Northern Athletics Conference and blog about them. I will do a mid-week blog talking about DIII basketball, upcoming big games in those conferences and other things that I deem worthy to grace my blog, while on weekends I will go/watch as many of the biggest games in the aforementioned conferences, analyzing and breaking down the games and what they mean for those teams and the conferences.
In the upcoming weeks I will be blogging about the three conferences and my predictions for them and also announcing the schedule of games that I plan on attending/watching, which will begin on December 1.
It's a novel concept that I'm going to try my best to uphold throughout this season. So sit back, follow me and enjoy the best that Division III has to offer.
P.S. And, yes, I will accept criticism and comments.
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