Damon Lasel keeps athletic trainers busy at New Jersey City University.
As he gets out of the bed, his hamstrings, knees and backs give him a daily reminder that college can take a toll on the body by playing volleyball. He has permanent appointments with a Had Vaidya and acupuncture in addition to frequent visits in the training room.
He said, “I have a professional team that is tapping me and sewing me together,” he laughed.
Those pain and pain are extended to lasel.
He is, finally, 40 years old.
Lasel played the middle blocker for the knights, and most of his peers were not born 20 years ago when he was one of the biggest stars of Division III. His first departure in the college ended as he was academically disqualified before he had a senior season.
With the encouragement of his wife, the father living at home went back to school to honor the wishes of his late mother to earn a degree and set an example for his three children. He also wanted to put a proper bow on his volleyball career.
Educational part is not a problem. Lasel is a fire fighting head with a 4.0-scale 3.8 grade-point average in the Dean list, and he is on track to graduate in this spring.
The volleyball part has been an adventure. He has been limited to 10 of the first 18 matches of the knights due to the classification of injuries. Not all belonged to volleyball. He missed the two matches with a classic dad injury – he taunted his hamstring shovel ice and the pain went on his back.
Lasalle does not jump high or grows as soon as possible. The way he describes it, he can immerse a basketball once and now hold the rim with both hands. The man can still play a little volleyball, though.
Nights coach Carlo Adra, who played with Lasel in NJCU since 2004-06, said that he showed two opposing coaches a photo array of the team and asked him to identify 40-year-old. Both pointed to anyone other than Lasel.
Lasalle can keep with his small peers, but he is not once frightened once. In 2006, he was once at the Old North East Collegiate Volleyball Association and the Division Player of the Week and Division Player of the Week, the top league of the Division III. He is a career leader of NJCU at Block Assist, and is at the desire to become the all -time leader of the program in total blocks wrapping his fourth season.
Former school sports information director Ira Thor said, “He was resumed at the hall of fame level in this college.”
Lasalle’s first term in NJCU suddenly ended. He was in the presiden training during the 2006 collapse when an assistant athletic director dropped him out of practice and told him that he was disqualified. His grade-point average was 1.4, which was equal to D-Plus.
“I was an athlete-student instead of a student-athlete,” he said. “It is for a lot of children, and I let it be far away. I reached a point when part of the athlete was not available to me, it was not as interesting to be a student. ,
So he left school and needed a job, sought help from Adra. Edra graduated a year ago and worked in a kitchen cabinet company. Adra recommended Lasel, and he spent six or seven years there and became a warehouse manager. Lasel married the woman who interviewed her for a job, and when Christina and she started a family, she was able to stay at home.
Lasalles live on a drive of about 35 minutes from Jersey City Campus in NJCU and their daughters are 4 and 6 years old and a son who is 8.
When she asked Christina if she would be fine with going to school and playing volleyball again, she told her that she would be proud if she did so.
“This gave me cow pumps,” he said. “This made me feel so that I can really do so.”
Lasel said that his biggest regret was getting out of school, and his desire to return back several years ago was strong when he came to his wife’s diploma from Ratgers.
“I saw it and I was,” I want one of them, “he said. “Carlo and I had a conversation, what if my children ask me why I do not have one, what would my answer be about them why I did not?”
Lasalle, Edra and their former team partners have been close for years, and during their Get-Tiathers or in their group texts, someone sometimes suggests to Lasel what they started academic and athletic.
In Division III, an athlete gets 10 semesters as a full -time student to play four season. There is no eligibility watch as Division I, so an athlete can leave school and come back, say, 20 years and where he left.
In the case of Lasel, he played three sessions in seven semesters. To achieve your grade and to preserve one of your remaining weather of eligibility, Lasel can only enroll as a part -time student and take some classes per semester.
The slogan of eligibility ended in the last summer. He became a full -time student in the fall and joined the team.
The only volleyball Lasel was played since 2006, which was with the EDRA in a summer Sand Volleyball League at a time.
“I am not coming to club court or anything,” Lasel said. “I was coming from the scrap pile, as they say, away from the couch.”
In fact, Lasel had been fit for years and once he decided to pursue the college volleyball again, he was picked up. Lasel knew that he would have to earn his time to play and that Adra would not give him special treatment due to two decades of friendship.
“If a child of your child is throwing an angry tantrum and you are getting late to practice, I got you to run, man,” Adra said he told Lasel.
Certainly, Lasel had trouble finding a parking lot in the premises, stopping for coffee on his way to practice one day and showed late. They were to run laps, 100 squat lifts, 30 pushups, three minutes wall sitting and three minutes coup.
“There are many days when I go home from these practices and I tell my wife,” Should I do this? Is I going to recover tomorrow? “Lassel said.” I wake up every day and I am here. ”
His colleagues embraced him, first called him “UNC” as an uncle. The surname “Big 40” and stuck. Team captain Alex Cassis said that he behaved Lasel as a partner of any other team when he started practice.
“I was not giving him props,” he said. “I couldn’t. I had to make sure that he was earning it in court. He hit a ball and I knew it was over. I knew we were good. ,
Lasel said that his approach was to mix with his new colleagues. This meant to calm down and do whatever he was doing. He said that he never expected to know from his colleagues what he had completed 20 years ago.
“He came with a sense of dignity,” said Kasaas. He said, “He stepped into court, and his head was down and he was going to work. I felt that a lot of young people see him, and this is the place where ‘Big 40’ has come. He is someone who was working hard as everyone, if it is not difficult.”
Lasel said that the game is fast, players jump more, the systems are more sophisticated and inequality between the top and below teams is small.
But if someone thought that Lasel would embarrass himself, he proved them wrong.
“It was a surprise for everyone that once we all met in the gym during the fall season, they started competing for the initial place,” Edra said. “The fact is that he is holding with those who are 21 years old and 20, 18 – it is like crazy.”
For Lasalle, it is crazy fun. He said that he rescues every moment because he finds out that he has got almost unimaginable opportunity. Recalling 2006, he said, “I played my last game, and I didn’t know it was my last game.”
And now?
“Every practice we finish, this is a low practice that I have before finishing,” he said. “So I don’t believe it. I don’t take any day.
College Games: /Hub /College-Sports
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