Chowan Men's Basketball Visits 9/11 Memorial
Chowan Men's Basketball Visits 9/11 Memorial
November 15, 2011
MURFREESBORO, NC - Play with a purpose.
Those words are echoed by coaches across the country on a daily
basis, in attempts to get the most out of a student-athlete's
performance.
On a recent road trip, the Chowan University Men's Basketball team
received a powerful message on what those four words really
mean.
The team competed in the University of Pitt-Johnstown Tournament
this past weekend in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. On Friday,
November 11th, Veteran's Day, the University unveiled a memorial in
the heart of its campus. The “Heroes Memorial”
pays tribute to those who died on September 11th, 2001, as well as
the members of the United States Armed Forces who have been killed
in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Before their game against Wheeling Jesuit University on Saturday
the 12th, Chowan Head Coach Dan DeRose took the team to the
memorial to share exactly what playing with a purpose means.
“I wanted them to get a sense of history and the impact of
what's going on in the world. I think at times we forget what
happened on 9/11 and what is still going on in the world
today,” he said.
“What they (team members) don't realize is a lot of the time
is that all these people died to continue your opportunity to live
and play basketball,” added DeRose. “You need to
always keep them in the back of your mind. When you play,
play for something.”
Play with a purpose. That message goes beyond basketball,
beyond all sports. Said DeRose, “You should have a
purpose every day in life, because you just don't know what is
going to happen. We have what we have today because brave men
and women are over there fighting for us.”
Dedication for the monument was held on Veteran's Day, and was
attended by more than 200 community members, the school's
president, and several members of the military.
Currently, the Heroes Memorial contains 9,208 names. 1,729
names represent the men and women killed in Afghanistan in the
years following the 9/11 attacks, and 4,456 names are those who
have been killed in Iraq, through August 22nd, 2011. Over
3,000 names represent those killed on 9/11, at the World Trade
Centers, the Pentagon, and on United Airlines Flight 93.
The centerpiece of the entire memorial is a 3,500 pound steel beam
recovered from of one of the World Trade Center towers.
“One of the things I told the guys to try to give them a
sense of the devastation on that day was to look at this steel beam
and how strong it is,” said DeRose. “But on that
day, it crumbled and was bent just like that. That's the type
of destruction that thousands of people had to deal
with.”
“It was very emotional for me,” said sophomore Antonio
Reddic. “These men and women are why we are able to
have the future we hope to have. I respect them and all of
their families that they left behind. If it wasn't for them,
who knows where we would be today. I am really happy we
went.”
Shanksville, Pennsylvania, the small town where United Airlines
Flight 93 crashed, is only about 25 miles away from the
Pitt-Johnstown campus. “Being nearby the place where
the plane crashed brought back memories of how those heroes
sacrificed their own lives for their country, and that made me feel
very blessed,” added Reddic.
For senior Lee Branscome, the trip helped put playing basketball
into perspective. “Coach D just wanted us to see that
there are people fighting to give us the opportunity to do what we
love to do, play college basketball. We play because they are
out there protecting our freedom. That's the lesson Coach D
shared with us.”
That was the lesson. To put basketball into
perspective. To play with a purpose.
