During the summer, I like relaxing, playing some video games, swimming and going to the University of Maryland food court and seeing three of the Terps' mens basketball players and a few other notable personalities. Being born and raise near College Park in University Park, right across Route 1, I am very familiar with most of the Terps' players, on the television of course. I had not seen any of the Maryland basketball players up close and personal before besides Dave Neal, who was a gentleman, for the record.
This week, I attended the Maryland Scholastic Press Association sports journalism with fellow Garbage Time blogger Kufere Laing. This camp is probably one of the most fun things I do the entire summer. To me, sitting around writing and talking about sports is very entertaining. The sportswriting program was taught by the Washington Post's Jon Denunzio (follow him on Twitter!), who was awesome. At about 12:30 everyday, after a morning spent rigorously blogging, we headed to the UMD student union for a lunch, and, apparently, so did a few basketball players.
On Monday, we had our most exciting experience, which Kufere wrote about earlier this week. Sitting down to chow down on a healthy meal from McDonald's, Kufere and I noticed a tall man get in line for Panda Express right across from us. We debated about his identity for about five seconds, then agreed he is in fact the face of the current Maryland Terps basketball team: Greivis Vasquez!! We approached him to get a picture after he had paid for his meal. He quietly muttered back, in barely understandable English, "alright man, one sec, lemme put this down." We got the picture, and contently sat down, with Grievis one table away. We were all surprised that Vasquez allowed us to take a picture with him, and I gained much more respect for Vasquez the man, not the player.
Then on Tuesday, our lunch didn't come close to the previous day's, but it was still good. After grabbing my highly nutritious double quarter-pounder (hold the cheese), I started walking back to our table when I notice another absurdly tall man sit down near McDonalds. I talk with another friend about which player he was, and we eventually agree that he is guard Adrian Bowie. Unfortunately, by the time I was able to tell my classmates, Bowie was far out of sight. But that wasn't it for lunch. About 30 minutes later, Kufere catches Helicopter from And 1 streetball walking out of the union. We followed him out, hoping for a picture. Sadly, Mr. Helicopter was talking on the phone the whole time, and we didn't want to interrupt. Very disappointing.
But that still wasn't it for Tuesday. After we had eaten and were sitting in the union, we noticed that three Maryland athletics employees were waiting in line with yet another tall guy in basketball shorts. We heard them talking about how the tall guy would give them "flexibility", and we knew he was a recruit. Eventually, we approached one of the guys in the Maryland polos. We told him that we were bloggers and we wanted to meet the new recruit they had. Surprisingly, they let us talk to him right away. We shook hands with the recruit, who was introduced as Matt. Unfortunately, we weren't able to catch his last name. Big ups to the Maryland athletics staff for letting us little guys talk to the recruits.
Wednesday was yet another adventure, although it was our last in chasing down athletes. While eating our lunch (McDonalds, yet again), Kufere and I spot another tall guy in basketball shorts. We couldn't decide who it was for a while, although we initially suspected it was Landon Milbourne. Our friend Ben corrected us, and told us that he was Cliff Tucker. As Tucker started to walk out, we urged our friends Jesse and Ben to get out of the lengthy McDonalds line to come get a picture. Ben quickly came and got his autograph, but Jesse came late, and we couldn't get a picture with Cliff. Yet another disappointing ending.
Although we only got a picture with one star, we still saw three Maryland ballers, one And 1 streetballer, and one future Terp (hopefully). In just four days, I would consider that to be a great haul. If only we could have seen former player Steve Blake roaming the halls... if only...
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