A career of writing and competing

Over the course of my time at Princeton, certain images have become permanently emblazoned on my mind — snapshots from four of the best years of my life.

There was the 4:58 p.m. run to glory the day my first JP was due, dashing across Scudder Plaza while several of my classmates zoomed past on bikes, trying to get to Corwin before the department secretary turned the key.

And there was that unfortunate encounter with the tree in front of Cloister after my OA leader taught me to play Beirut freshman year.

But all mad dashes aside, I suppose that more than anything else, sports have defined my existence on this campus.

I came here in the fall of 1997 not fully aware of what Princeton athletics really were. I knew about the men's basketball team's thrilling upset in the NCAA tournament two season's prior, and the exploits of our men's lacrosse team, but that was it.

I didn't know that Princeton had the second-largest athletic program in terms of the number of teams. I didn't know of the success of our crew programs or that Princeton was one of the few schools that had both women's squash and men's volleyball as varsity teams.

But I had heard of lightweight football. I'm convinced that at some point in my lifetime I saw ESPN do a piece on SportsCenter about lightweight football.

For the past four years, I've been a member of the lightweight (now sprint) football team — and that has meant more to me than any other thing I have been a part of on this campus.

I hope that other senior athletes can say the same thing about their experiences.

I joined the staff of the 'Prince' as a sophomore at the suggestion of a friend of mine who knew of my mild obsession with sports. Since then, I have attempted to carry my experience from the playing field to the columns of this page.

Sometimes, it's hard, especially if a team that I'm covering doesn't play well. I know how bad it is to have random students criticize you when you play poorly — but it's worse when your friends do it. I've had my entire team compared to a popular stress reduction device after one particularly bad game.

The best times for me at this paper have occurred when I least expect them. Dragging myself down to Jadwin for a women's basketball game in February 2000, I anticipated a lopsided loss to Dartmouth in the last home game of the season. Instead, the team put forth one of the most inspiring performances I've witnessed knocking off the Ivy leaders.

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When the final horn sounded, the seniors hugged at midcourt, while their teammates ran off the bench and surrounded them. That image of team unity, in an otherwise bleak season, is one of the reasons that we play sports, and is one that I will not soon forget.

Perhaps my most vivid memory at Princeton, was the first time I was moved to tears while on campus.

It was sophomore year, and the sprint football team was playing Navy, which had beaten us by 47 the previous year. I wasn't expecting to play in the game, but was thrown in during the first quarter because of a teammate's injury and never came back out.

I spent the second half of a tight game fearful that my mistake would cost our team its first victory of my career. When the game dragged into overtime, the tension got worse.

We scored on the first possession of OT and converted the PAT, but Navy answered right back. As I lined up to try to block the subsequent kick, I was as tight as I've ever been.

Then it was over. The kick sailed wide left; the game ended. All the tension, all the anxiety, all the exhaustion came rushing out of my body as I sprinted in a random upfield direction, arms outstretched in the joy of victory.

When things settled down, after we shook hands with our opponents, I started bawling. To this day, I don't know why. As I hugged my friends family, I couldn't speak, I could barely breathe, all I could muster was a smile between gasps for air.

It was the very experience that explains why people play sports — a moment of unbridled exuberance, followed by a release of all emotion. It's for moments like these that quarter of this campus plays a varsity sport. That is what Princeton Athletics is.

It's the same reason that I enjoyed writing for the 'Prince'— the hope of conveying the emotion of the moment to readers the following day.