Northwestern University Athletics
Seniors Prepare for Final Curtain Call
3/4/2016 2:46:00 PM | Men's Basketball
By Skip Myslenski
NUsports.com Special Contributor
Tre Demps does not know how he will react on this Sunday afternoon, and that is no surprise. You cannot practice for Senior Day, or rehearse the role you will play on that occasion. You simply stand on the edge of the court, and listen as your career is recounted, and then--with those who are closest to you--stride to center stage as warm applause washes over you. So it is no wonder that the guard, when asked what he will be feeling at that moment, will finally say, "I have no idea. I'm usually a person who holds his emotions in. But I don't know. It'll be interesting. I have no idea, to be honest."
Nor does Alex Olah know how the emotions of the moment will effect him, though he can avow with certainty that, "It's going to be a unique moment." Here is why. At the ceremony he will be accompanied not only by Greg & Paula Smith and their children Ethan and Paige, the host family that has been part of his life since he came to the United States as a 16-year old high school junior. He will also be joined by his father Lucian and his mother Adriana and his brother Sebastian, who flew in from their home in Romania on Friday and will be seeing him play in person for the first time since the summer of 2010.
"Not many people," Olah will finally go on, "have the opportunity to walk out there with two families who love you equally. It's going to be a great moment. It's going to be emotional. I'm going to try and keep it to myself. But I know it's going to be emotional."
••••••••••
The grad student Joey van Zegeren, who joined the 'Cats this season after graduating from Virginia Tech, will be honored on Sunday as well, but he will not play. His season was ended by a knee injury he suffered at practice last Monday. "I feel badly for Joey," Chris Collins said of him. "He's been a great guy coming in here. With the injury to Alex, he started some games. He's been a great veteran presence. The guys love him. It just stinks that he's not going to be able to finish out the year with us."
Tre Demps, in stark contrast, is acutely aware that his 'Cat career is rushing toward its finish, and that knowledge impels him as the end draws ever closer. "There's a sense of urgency that comes naturally when you realize the games are winding down," is how he put it after his team's win over Rutgers last week.
"Right now, it's just a sprint," he said more recently when asked how the urgency here is different from the urgency that accompanied him throughout his career. "When you're running a race, there's times when you try to push yourself as much as you can. But when you see that finish line so close, you just want to sprint and just give everything you have in every facet of life. That's what I'm trying to do here on the court. At every practice, just be as energetic and as attentive as possible, and just play every game knowing that it's going to be one of my last games."
Is it hard for him to believe it's almost over?
"Yes and no. I've been here for a long time. I've never lived anywhere longer than four years and I've been here five. So it almost feels like I've been here a lifetime. But I've enjoyed it. It's been a lot of great memories, a lot of great people here at the university. I'm just great appreciative of how everyone has treated me."
"I'm really proud of Tre," Collins will later say of him. "I've talked about it a lot. Tre was the biggest gym rat when I got here, the one guy I used as an example of what I wanted for this program. It's OK to come a a great school like this and get a great education and get everything Northwestern has to offer, and still want to be a pro basketball player. That's OK. Tre was the one guy, from day one, he was always in here working. But initially it was a solo mission, and the thing that I'm really proud of Tre for is not only did he continue to do that, but he learned to incorporate others. So now, when I hear the ball bouncing at night or in the morning, it's not just Tre. It's four or five guys. He set the tone for that in our program. He's become more outgoing. He's become a better player."
That last can also be said of Olah, whose freshman season with the 'Cats was a harsh reality check. "When I got to college," he will say, thinking back, "I was just thrown in there to play against people like (former Indiana star and current Hornet) Cody Zeller, these top five picks in the draft. So I kind of got beat up and was kind of down on myself. I had no confidence, no anything. I was kind of thinking, 'What am I going to accomplish in my college career?'"
That was his mindset when Collins was hired in the spring of '13, a spring that eventually found Olah back in Indiana on break and Collins in Indianapolis with Duke at the NCAA Regionals. "Hey, coach. I'm 30 minutes away from you. Can I come and talk?" Olah would eventually text.
"That's where I said to him, 'I just want to be coached. I want to be a good player. I want to be the best I can be. Can you help me do that?'" he now remembers, remembering the talk they then had. "He said yes and he delivered."
"I'll never forget it. It made such a great impression," Collins himself will finally say of that meeting. "We sat down for about an hour and basically he just looked me in the eye and said, 'Coach, I want to be a good player. But I need help.' I promised him that day, with the staff that I'd put together, we'd give him everything we had to help him become better, and he's put in the work.
"So it's cool now to see where he's at three years later. He's walking around with his chest up. That first day he walked in, his head was down, he was unsure of himself, he was a very uncomfortable kid. To see him now smiling, chest up, feeling great about the player and the man he's become, it's great. And the thing that makes me even happier is his parents are going to be here from Romania. That's going to be an emotional moment for them, to see not only what a special place this is. But also for his parents to see how loved Alex is. That's going to be a great day."
That day called Senior Day.
NUsports.com Special Contributor
Tre Demps does not know how he will react on this Sunday afternoon, and that is no surprise. You cannot practice for Senior Day, or rehearse the role you will play on that occasion. You simply stand on the edge of the court, and listen as your career is recounted, and then--with those who are closest to you--stride to center stage as warm applause washes over you. So it is no wonder that the guard, when asked what he will be feeling at that moment, will finally say, "I have no idea. I'm usually a person who holds his emotions in. But I don't know. It'll be interesting. I have no idea, to be honest."
Nor does Alex Olah know how the emotions of the moment will effect him, though he can avow with certainty that, "It's going to be a unique moment." Here is why. At the ceremony he will be accompanied not only by Greg & Paula Smith and their children Ethan and Paige, the host family that has been part of his life since he came to the United States as a 16-year old high school junior. He will also be joined by his father Lucian and his mother Adriana and his brother Sebastian, who flew in from their home in Romania on Friday and will be seeing him play in person for the first time since the summer of 2010.
"Not many people," Olah will finally go on, "have the opportunity to walk out there with two families who love you equally. It's going to be a great moment. It's going to be emotional. I'm going to try and keep it to myself. But I know it's going to be emotional."
••••••••••
The grad student Joey van Zegeren, who joined the 'Cats this season after graduating from Virginia Tech, will be honored on Sunday as well, but he will not play. His season was ended by a knee injury he suffered at practice last Monday. "I feel badly for Joey," Chris Collins said of him. "He's been a great guy coming in here. With the injury to Alex, he started some games. He's been a great veteran presence. The guys love him. It just stinks that he's not going to be able to finish out the year with us."
Tre Demps, in stark contrast, is acutely aware that his 'Cat career is rushing toward its finish, and that knowledge impels him as the end draws ever closer. "There's a sense of urgency that comes naturally when you realize the games are winding down," is how he put it after his team's win over Rutgers last week.
"Right now, it's just a sprint," he said more recently when asked how the urgency here is different from the urgency that accompanied him throughout his career. "When you're running a race, there's times when you try to push yourself as much as you can. But when you see that finish line so close, you just want to sprint and just give everything you have in every facet of life. That's what I'm trying to do here on the court. At every practice, just be as energetic and as attentive as possible, and just play every game knowing that it's going to be one of my last games."
Is it hard for him to believe it's almost over?
"Yes and no. I've been here for a long time. I've never lived anywhere longer than four years and I've been here five. So it almost feels like I've been here a lifetime. But I've enjoyed it. It's been a lot of great memories, a lot of great people here at the university. I'm just great appreciative of how everyone has treated me."
"I'm really proud of Tre," Collins will later say of him. "I've talked about it a lot. Tre was the biggest gym rat when I got here, the one guy I used as an example of what I wanted for this program. It's OK to come a a great school like this and get a great education and get everything Northwestern has to offer, and still want to be a pro basketball player. That's OK. Tre was the one guy, from day one, he was always in here working. But initially it was a solo mission, and the thing that I'm really proud of Tre for is not only did he continue to do that, but he learned to incorporate others. So now, when I hear the ball bouncing at night or in the morning, it's not just Tre. It's four or five guys. He set the tone for that in our program. He's become more outgoing. He's become a better player."
That last can also be said of Olah, whose freshman season with the 'Cats was a harsh reality check. "When I got to college," he will say, thinking back, "I was just thrown in there to play against people like (former Indiana star and current Hornet) Cody Zeller, these top five picks in the draft. So I kind of got beat up and was kind of down on myself. I had no confidence, no anything. I was kind of thinking, 'What am I going to accomplish in my college career?'"
That was his mindset when Collins was hired in the spring of '13, a spring that eventually found Olah back in Indiana on break and Collins in Indianapolis with Duke at the NCAA Regionals. "Hey, coach. I'm 30 minutes away from you. Can I come and talk?" Olah would eventually text.
"That's where I said to him, 'I just want to be coached. I want to be a good player. I want to be the best I can be. Can you help me do that?'" he now remembers, remembering the talk they then had. "He said yes and he delivered."
"I'll never forget it. It made such a great impression," Collins himself will finally say of that meeting. "We sat down for about an hour and basically he just looked me in the eye and said, 'Coach, I want to be a good player. But I need help.' I promised him that day, with the staff that I'd put together, we'd give him everything we had to help him become better, and he's put in the work.
"So it's cool now to see where he's at three years later. He's walking around with his chest up. That first day he walked in, his head was down, he was unsure of himself, he was a very uncomfortable kid. To see him now smiling, chest up, feeling great about the player and the man he's become, it's great. And the thing that makes me even happier is his parents are going to be here from Romania. That's going to be an emotional moment for them, to see not only what a special place this is. But also for his parents to see how loved Alex is. That's going to be a great day."
That day called Senior Day.
••••••
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