The word "excited", a term most people resort to when expressing their joy for something, could never correctly describe my feeling for this year's college basketball season.
Anxious.
Elated.
Fired up.
Those adjectives, courtesy of thesaurus.com, do my happiness for this time of year much more justice. But it's not because Ohio State is supposed to be the best they've been since I was a freshman or because Kent State students actually care about what happens on a court rather than a field. It's because of a fifth-year senior that reminds me of my glory days every single time he makes a shot.
David Lighty and I entered OSU as part of the freshman class of 2006. Though he never personally knew me, we have a connection that is one of those "small-world" scenarios. He played three-on-three with Daequan Cook and Mike Conley Jr., against some of my good friends outside Stradley Hall. He used to stop by Morrill Tower to visit Shavelle Little and Lesslee Mason, two freshmen on the women's team, and also my suitemates. And there was one weekend when I was convinced his teammate, Greg Oden, was stalking me. Every single party or bar I snuck into, Oden was sure to be close by. Also, when I worked at Victoria's Secret, Oden came shopping with one of his lady-friends and was responsible for the first-and last- line of teenage boys outside the lingerie store.
So you see, Lighty and I are only separated by one degree. But the separation is not the only reason I have a soft-spot for him.
As a first-year graduate student, I constantly feel stuck in limbo between that undergraduate youthfulness and that graduate responsibility to self. I want to party five nights in a row and function normally each morning but the sad reality is that I can't.
Let me clarify: I worked my butt off in journalism school and managed to graduate Cum Laude, leading me to a full ride at Kent State. The only time I really went out five nights a week was spring quarter senior year when I set my schedule up in a way that was conducive to my "Go hard or go home" mentality of that final ten weeks. I was determined to go out with a bang. If I ever tried to do that again I would surely die. But anyone who was/is a social drinker in college will tell you it's not so much the actual substance they are obsessed with but the ridiculous, "man, if my mother found out about this" stories they have with friends the next day.
For me, I was one of the lucky ones who made friends that I could create memories with sober, and work together with to elicit a collective memory following a night of heavy debauchery. I would never be able to list these stories in a blog; that piece of work will be saved for a novel. But whenever I watch David Lighty play I am reminded of the last four years of my life and how meaningful they were to my journey.
I would love to re-do some of my experiences, either to correct the mistakes or make the fantastic fabulous. There are also some that I never got the chance to enjoy, so I wouldn't mind giving them a shot. But I am in grad school now, 2 hours from Columbus. My visits only happen on weekends and my freshman forgiveness has long expired.
Now, in his final year of eligibility, Lighty is determined to accomplish feats that he missed in the last four years. If I had chosen to pick up another major and take a fifth year, I would have undoubtedly done the same.
Already, he's had the chance to re-live one of the most scarring moments of his career, besides his season-ending injury. In 2007, OSU and Florida faced-off for the NCAA National Championship. Instead of the Buckeyes making up on the court what the football team couldn't do on the field, they were also outplayed by the SEC powerhouse. This marked the second of two blemishes that tarnished my otherwise flawless first-year experience.
Tuesday night, OSU played in the rematch it had been anticipating for more than three and a half years. The Buckeyes knew the stakes were high. The SEC has historically owned OSU, and the Buckeyes hadn't won a non-conference, top-10, regular season road game since 1961. Florida held a slight edge the first half, and, going into half-time, I was slightly prepared for the usual disappointment my teams throw at me. But, with 26 points, and a smile after every single one of them, Lighty and his teammates owned Florida in the second-half. Those little blue pom-poms and smurf people were not enough to scare away the Bucks from Gator territory. Once it became a 15-point game, Lighty finally received freshman forgiveness from the sports gods.
Luckily, for athletes, anytime they have a bad game, they get to hear "it's okay, there's always next year". Sometimes there is no "next year" for certain match-ups, but generally, they get a second shot at something. In academia, freshman year is your one shot to get it right.
Though most of his first-year teammates have long since moved on to other endeavors, either the NBA, ESPN or the infinite injury report (poor Greg Oden), Lighty remains the oldest member on the Buckeye roster. He is the only person in Scarlet and Gray who fully knows what the Gator pain feels like. I always say everything happens for a reason. Had Lighty not been injured his junior year, he never would have been able to give that pain right back.
That second chance was a defining moment in Lighty's career, and the rest of OSU's season. With three and a half months until March Madness, I am excited to see what's going to unfold. College sports are everything but predictable, and if it weren't for those little second chances, the sweetness of it all wouldn't taste this good.
