By Brodee Gillam
Viking Longboat
Haslett HS
1st Place
Division 3, News Writing
Sports Columnist
“A peek into real-life reporting,”
What is it like to be a sports journalist? We have all wanted to be the guy on ESPN making sports puns while talking over highlights of the Giants-Jets game. But that only makes up one percent of the business.
I got to travel down to the University of Detroit Mercy Titans campus for a media day, where they showed us, student journalists, what it is like to be a professional.
I walked into Calihan Hall, was welcomed to my seat and got to watch a first quarter shootout between the UDM women and Salem International, where five of the first six buckets were 3s.
My group and I got pulled out of the game to talk to the president of mens basketball operations for UDM, the president of the university, the new assistant coach, former NBA point guard Jermaine Jackson and senior guard Carlton Brundidge.
After hearing from the three of them, we went back to our seats to see Brundidge and the men play a 6-1 Northeastern University team.
Within the first 5 minutes Brundidge was on the bench with two fouls. Meanwhile, Northeastern senior David Walker was putting on his best Stephen Curry impression, going six for six from range, with 18 points in the first half.
But the Titans pulled it out in the end with a 76-73 win with defensive pressure on Northeastern’s guards.
Overall, being involved in a professional journalism environment, where you could have to rewrite your story in the last five minutes of the game. Five minutes? It’s hard for a high school student to write a story in five days.
Just being a part of the next level of journalism shows how fun it really is, even if it isn’t doing the ESPN commentary.
“Butting heads, throwing trash”
When it comes to bitter rivals, nothing is ever held back. In the dictionary, a rival is “a person or thing competing with another for the same objective or for superiority in the same field of activity.”
For me, a rivalry can not be put into words. A rivalry can only be described by moments. An Auburn-Alabama game from 2013, returning a field goal 100 yards back for a touchdown. It is a way of life.
Haslett fans would be lost without the DeWitt game on the schedule. Michigan fans would be the same without knowing they will play Michigan State and Ohio State. Trick plays, tremendous pressure and bragging rights, all wrapped up into 60 minutes of football are part of rivalry fan fare.
The Michigan-MSU game Saturday took rivalry to the next level. The historic final play. 23-20, Michigan leading with 10 seconds left, fourth down, blocked punt, touchdown MSU, game over 27-23. The fans and players went from having great sportsmanship to, in modern terms, being savages.
Jalen Watts-Jackson, laying in the end zone with a fractured hip, was harassed by Michigan fans. On the other side, Michigan State players taunting Michigan fans with the Paul Bunyan Trophy they so desired. Rivalries can bring the best out of players, but the worst out of fans and players after the clock goes 00:00.
Rivalries can take dangerous turns on the field. During the homecoming game against DeWitt, senior Jake Tahaney took a hit to the head that put him on the bench for the rest of the game. Three plays earlier, sophomore Nate Magnusson had his head targeted by the Panthers. Being disrespectful and not liking each other on and off the field is fine. It feeds the rivalry. But player safety should always be first.
Head coach Charlie Otlewski is troubled by some questionable hits from recent DeWitt teams.
“It has become way too common from DeWitt, and I know it’s not taught,” Otlewski said. “I don’t know why it’s happening and it has happened multiple times over the last three or four years. It has been the continuous hits to the head that have been occurring.”
This frustration boiled over into an argument between Otlewski and DeWitt head coach Rob Zimmerman during the handshake line at the end of the game on Oct. 3.
But tonight is a new game. A game of hard football, with vicious tackles, but without targeting plays. High school football players die from concussions, keep it clean fellas.