GU Nation

Wow! It's been over a month since I've posted anything, and I apologize for that. With the beginning of Gonzaga basketball season, a recent visit from a few close college friends, and yesterday's kick-off of the Gonzaga Alumni Chapter in Oahu, I started thinking about just how valuable my four years at Gonzaga truly were.

There's something to be said about what type of person Gonzaga creates, but it's hard to put a finger on it. When I went on the Ignation Leaders Scholarship retreat my senior year of high school, I met this dude named Eric Mertens who was a junior at GU. He was a renaissance man, involved in a ton of different things on and off campus and extremely charismatic, and I remember thinking how cool it would be to turn out like him. I think that looking back, Gonzaga did shape me into that type of person, as it did for countless others.

I just watched Decade of Excellence, the documentary on the last 10 years of Gonzaga basketball. There's a scene in which Dan Dickau recalls his last college game, when the Zags were knocked out of the NCAA tournament. It was suddenly setting in that his career at Gonzaga was over, and he began to cry on the court. Kyle Bankhead came up to him and told him he had a lot to be proud of. In the interview, Dickau gets choked up about how much that meant to him and says about Bankhead, "That's the type of person that comes to Gonzaga." I couldn't agree more, because I could spend years listing off all the times my friends at GU picked me up just like that. When my brother was sick and I was commuting home to see him, my roommates made it way easier by offering all sorts of help and always trying to cheer me up. Kate Orizotti even bought me flowers when she found out what was going on. I could list so many other examples. People like that are hard to find anywhere you go, but they seemed to be all over the place at Gonzaga. What I had there was a community, a family.

The beauty of it is that the family didn't fall apart after graduation. I'm fortunate to have several Gonzaga alumns out here who are more than just friends with similar backgrounds. The Gonzaga experience that we shared back in Spokane has meshed with the Aloha Spirit out here and I truly do consider them my family away from home. They know who they are, and I think we can all agree on it. People roll their eyes when they see us together doing Gonzaga cheers or reminiscing, but it's part of being a Bulldog.

My mom graduated in the late 70's, and she is still part of that community and family. It's rich with tradition and memories. At the alumni kick-off last night, I was elated to find that there were plenty of others out here who are part of it. We're everywhere. So if you see a Zag and wonder what their deal is, now you know. If you are a Zag, you're already well aware. We are GU.