Well, let's get the next one

We didn't have a good outing for our first game since our sicknesses. It's tough to win a game when you score 45 points and have 25 turnovers - not pretty to say the least. We have an opportunity to get back in the swing with our game Wednesday. It's another long road trip - 10-12 hours by bus - so that should be a good time (sarcasm intended). Everything is all better with a win though. That's just the way it is I guess.
Our schedule has been changing frequently lately. There is a handball tournament in our gym so our game today had to be rescheduled. I just wanted to inform any of you who were wondering.
I'm feeling better - just trying to regain all the weight I lost. They have me taking all kinds of pills to get totally rid of the illness. I ask them what they all are and they give me vague descriptions, which makes me a little leery. I just have to trust I guess. I hope this post finds all of you doing well.

Take care and God bless

And the plague struck...

Well, we had our game canceled for today. Everyone started to get ill on Thursday and it has continued since. I don't know if it was something we ate or just a virus, but it is nasty. I am just starting to be able to eat again. I have been trying to get anything that will stay down - so far yogurt and bananas have treated me well. I just want to get better, but I have to remain patient I guess. Since we were getting dehydrated, the coach wanted us to go to the hospital to get an IV. That seemed to help our aching muscles, but didn't help with the stomach problem. I hope we are ready by the time Wednesday comes for our game. It will take some time to get our strength back to 100%, but I hope it goes well. That has been the news recently. Just wanted to inform all of you what was going on because we didn't have our game today. I pray that all of you are staying healthy over in the states.

Take care and God bless

I officially strongly dislike buses :)

We went into another overtime game this past weekend and ended with another win. We didn't play well at all collectively and had 25 turnovers. Fortunately the other team had 21. Yes, we played terrible, but when you win in overtime on the road despite playing poorly, it's a good thing in my opinion. Grinding out those games is important. I didn't play particularly well in the shooting department. I ended with 11 points I believe. There is always next game I guess.

Besides winning the game, the trip was anything but fun though. I simply cannot sleep on those buses. It's a charter bus and the seats recline slightly, but with the roads winding back and forth, it's tough to get some shut-eye. There is a mountain range in the middle of the country that we had to go through and the roads are anything but straight. The roads are a big difference between Romania and Austria. In Austria they had four-lane freeways with tunnels that went through the mountains, but in Romania the roads go between the mountains and there are only two-lane roads that go through all the towns. The distance of the trip wasn't even that far, but traveling slowly through every town on the way takes time. We got back at about 6 a.m. and I couldn't wait to sleep in a bed. It was crazy though because I talked to my teammates the next day and no one could fall asleep until about 7:30 that morning. All that traveling messes with your body for sure. I had the same problem, but it was great sleep once I finally fell asleep.

We play again this Saturday at home. We played this team in our league during the preseason and they beat us by about ten points I think. Nonetheless, it will be a good game.

Take care and God bless

On the road

It was a good win last night. I don't think many people expected us to win because everyone was overly excited when we won. The team was expected to win the championship this year I guess and they have a tradition of always being good with a high budget. It was good to see Tyronn back on the floor. He wasn't too happy with how he played, but I thought he played solid minutes for being out three weeks. Yes, it was a good win, but it doesn't mean anything if we lose on Saturday so we can't get complacent.

We are out on the road tomorrow for our away game on Saturday. I guess it will take about 10 hours by bus to get there :( We will leave in the morning and then stay overnight tomorrow night so we are hopefully rested for the game. That is one good thing about playing in a small country like Austria: short road trips. Oh well. I have a book and Andrea's iPod with some movies on it so I should be alright.

Just wanted to give everyone a heads-up to what's going on :)

Take care and God bless

If we play, we might as well win

This past week hasn't been too eventful - just practice mostly. I had spoken about our game that had been canceled this past Saturday and how it had been moved up to Wednesday of last week. I was going into it focused like any other game, but found out from one of my teammates during the second half that it was only a scrimmage and wasn't worth anything. That may sound foolish, but there were still refs, we still kept score, there were fans present. I just feel out of the loop with information sometimes, but that happened a lot last year as well. Go with the flow I guess. We actually do have a league game tomorrow though. Our coach is making it seem like it's the Super Bowl he is so worked up about it. It's a home game and they are picked to win the league or at least finish at the top. Nonetheless he has been talking about it constantly and how good of a team they are. That's refreshing to me actually. At least we are trying to win every game. That's about it for now. I hope everything is going well back in the states. Take care and God bless.

ESPN Article

The post Michael is referring to got deleted due to some technical difficulties. I'll paraphrase it again here. ESPN contacted Mike via Facebook (stellar reporting) and asked him about an incident involving Coach Bruce Pearl, who was coaching UW-Milwaukee at the time. Pearl is in hot water right now for a series of recruiting violations committed at UWM and Tennessee, where he is the current coach.

Here is the link to the article http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=5648545

Check out the article. It seems like such a random story and centers around a discrete event that occurred over six years ago. Mike did not comment, but that didn't stop this ambitious, Facebook-messaging reporter from running with it.

I made the point that, at the time Mike was being recruited, UW-Milwaukee had just made the NCAA tournament and cracked into the AP Top 25 basketball rankings. On paper, this organization was seen as a much more glamorous choice than their conference rival Green Bay. As we know Mike went to Green Bay and decided not to play for Bruce Pearl. I think Mike deserves our gratitude for choosing the less popular school and avoiding the shady coach.

Sorry about needing to repost. Please remember to comment on the posts if you can. Feedback is greatly appreciated.

As Mom would say, "...remain flexible."

Once again, it has been too long since I last posted - no excuses. As Joel mentioned, I did promise him I would post more so I will try my best to do just that. I would first like to express my gratitude to my buddy, Joel, for writing the past post. He said it absolutely beautifully, and I could not have done a better job. I truly believe he could have a career in writing if he goes for it. With that said it was unfortunate that I was included in this whole fiasco with Bruce Pearl, but what's done is done. It was negative attention that I did not want, but I hope it dissolves quickly. I really appreciate Joel for writing that flattering post.

As far as basketball goes, we started our regular season with a win in double overtime last Saturday. We had chances to finish the game many times, but we always managed to let them slip back into it. Although I wasn't particularly happy with the way I ended the game, I did end up shooting the ball well with 25 points. We have another game tomorrow actually. It was supposed to be this Saturday, but the gym was being occupied by that city's expo with events for the public. That is one thing that is different about venues over here. Many different groups use the same gym, where it seemed like I could always get into our college gym if I wanted to shoot. Our assistant coach said he coached at a city in Romania where 11 different teams and groups used the same gym. He said the gym was being used continuously from 7 am to 10 pm. I always wondered why my coaches here kind of gave me a strange look when I asked whether there was a time the gym was open to get in extra shots. Our gym situation isn't quite that extreme, but it still is occupied all the time it seems. Needless to say, I believe sports programs in the states are pretty fortunate for the most part. On a side note, I also found out that you can watch play-by-play of our games at http://www.frbaschet.ro/
I haven't tried it, but just in case you wanted to give it a whirl.

There is a zoo here in Oradea that Tyronn and I had wanted to check out before it got too cold. We had a nice day several days ago so we decided to see what it was all about. It was only donations to get in so that was nice, but after we walked through the zoo and were on our way out we decided to donate more. They had quite a few animals, but we could tell they just didn't have the funds or resources to give the proper space and living conditions for the animals. That was a little disheartening but it was still a nice change of scenery, nonetheless.

Well, I missed the October birthday party for my family this past weekend. Since there are so many of us it seems like there is always a birthday going on :) I sure miss being able to be there for events. That is the price I pay for being on the other side of the world I guess, although I missed many events when I was at school in Green Bay as well - such is life I guess. There are many things that we cannot control in life, such as what's in the media. There are also downsides we need to deal with while chasing our dreams. In such events, Mom's quote comes to mind: "In this life we must remain flexible."

Take care and God bless.