October 22, 2009
The Red Corner
The story of boxing on the Georgetown campus dates to 1920's, but the current version of the sport can trace its roots to the Marty Gallagher pugilists of the 1940's and 50's. Tom Quinn '55, a retired investment executive and an accomplished film and stage actor, was one of Marty's heavyweights and is now a boxing instructor at Yates Field House. He is a former NCAA Eastern Heavyweight Champion and a member of the Georgetown University Athletic Hall of Fame. In this guest blog, he shares the experience last spring of preparing one of his pupils for an intercollegiate bout.
"So -""So?"
"So, aren't you going to give me any last minute instructions? Words of advice or anything like that?"
We were standing in the boxing room at Yates Field House on the campus of Georgetown University. It was 9:15 on a Thursday night and we had just finished boxing classes for the week. Alex Oleskar, an 18-year old, 147-pound freshman in the School of Foreign Service, was talking with me, his coach.
On Saturday we were driving to the University of Maryland for Alex's first amateur boxing match, "Oh, I have some things I want to say to you, Alex. We'll talk before you go in the ring."
Saturday morning, we met at 11:30 in the parking lot at Yates - Alex, myself, John L., Ray, Steve, John S., my assistant coaches. Dan, the other boxer who was competing that day, an older, more experienced graduate student, had driven up earlier with his girlfriend. We loaded our equipment into four cars - bag gloves, hand pads, big gloves, mouthpieces, water bottles, water bucket, gauze for hand wraps, tape, Vaseline, sponges, latex gloves, scissors, Q-tips, towels - more equipment than a new mother takes for her infant's first visit to Grandma's house. Alex rode with me.
How you feeling?"Terrific. Great. Perfect."
"This is really your first match?"
"First one!"
"Well, in the gym you looked pretty good for a novice. Have you had a lot of gym experience?"
"Oh, yeah. I've been boxing since I was seven or eight. I was born in Moscow and we moved here when I was four. We're Russian Jews. My family now lives out side of Boston, but I've lived in a lot of different places and I would always try to find a gym. I've had a lot of coaches but they were never able to get me any matches. I really love to box but I was always frustrated that I hadn't had a real fight. See, I was never a good athlete.
I stunk at everything. My grandfather was an Olympic weightlifter in Russia and my father was on the national soccer team. They always teased me about not being an athlete and I always wanted to show them that I was an athlete, too."
His cell phone rang. Alex said "excuse me, I have to take this." He began speaking in Russian. I didn't understand a word he was saying, of course.
There was a pause. "Mama. Mama. Mom . . .” I didn't have to know Russian to understand, "Mom, I'm fine. I know what I'm doing. I'll be OK. I'll call you after. I'll be fine."
He gave me an apologetic smile. "That was my Mom. She doesn't really like me boxing, but she said that if I'm going to fight, I better win."
We drove in silence for a while up U.S. Route 1, toward the U. of Maryland campus where boxers from about twelve colleges would be competing. I asked Alex what he was studying at Georgetown.
"International Security."
"International Securities?"
"No! Security. You know, making the world safe. Stuff like that." He grinned. His cell rang.
"Hi." More Russian, this time sounding more like guy talk, then subtly switching to unmistakably father and son talk. The last words were in English. "I love you too."
"That was my Dad. He said he's proud of me."
Dan's bout was fourth on the afternoon card. He boxed coolly and cleverly with a tough rangy 175-pounder from U. of West Virginia, scoring a standing eight count in the first round and winning a unanimous decision. It was his seventh win against two losses. I sensed that he was more pleased with himself than he was willing to show. He introduced me to his girlfriend, Kathleen. She was a redhead and she had never seen a boxing match before.
When we got to the boxing venue we didn't know whom our opponents would be. Luke Runion, the Maryland coach who had organized the program was extremely conscientious about matching opponents evenly. Navy had a kid Alex's size- a few pounds lighter, but he had had ten bouts - a big advantage against a complete novice. I told Alex the situation. "This guy has a record of seven and three. Not great, but a lot more experience. You don't have to take the fight if you don't want to."
Alex said "But I came here to fight. OK, he's had experience. But he's been beaten. I'll take the fight." I told him I knew he would. I told Luke and Jim McNally, the Navy coach, that we'd take the fight. They told me that they had found another boxer for Alex, a slightly bigger kid from Gettysburg College, also fighting his first bout. I told Alex about the change. He shrugged.
I sat Alex on the bench in the locker room and turned a chair around so he could put his hands on the back of the chair while I wrapped his hands for his first fight. For everyday training, Alex, like all amateur boxers, wrap their hands in standard cloth wraps. I had decided to dramatize the event by doing the ritual the way the pros do it - rolls and rolls of fine gauze, carefully wound around the wrist and thumb, across the knuckles and the back of the hand, with thin strips of tape between the fingers and a broad band of tape around the wrist. Then I gave him the final advice he had been waiting for since Thursday night.
"Now, Alex. In the unlikely event that you get knocked down, don't bounce right back up. Get to one knee and pick up the ref's count. Look to me in the corner. When I signal for you to get up, you get up. Now, the guy will probably come charging at you, thinking he's gonna get a knockout. He'll probably come flailing at you. Stand flat with your hands up and put a left jab right down his throat. Then move out of there and box, box, box. Got it?"
"Got it."
"Good. Now, if you knock HIM down, go right to the neutral corner and wait for the ref to signal you to continue. When you move to the guy, give him something - a fake, a move, something - check his reflexes. See if he's hurt. If you dropped him with a right, start the right but come back with a left hook. If you drop him with the hook, fake it and come back with the right. They usually expect you to throw the same punch you put 'em down with. You got all that?" We laced on his twelve-ounce red gloves and headed upstairs to the ring.
The kid from Gettysburg was powerfully built, in obviously good condition, and with a stand-up style, gloves held high. Alex moved around him easily, mixing his punches cleverly, showing more style than I had realized he had. I thought he won the first round easily.
In the second round, the Gettysburg boxer came out stronger, more determined, and landed a good right hand to Alex's head. The referee put up his hands, signaling "Stop". He sent the other guy to the neutral corner and walked to Alex. In amateur boxing, bouts are often stopped when one fighter is clearly outmatched or hurt or unable to continue or, more often, the boxer is given a standing eight count. But Alex clearly hadn't been hurt. What the hell was going on? What were they pulling on us?
The ref led Alex to his corner and pointed to his foot. "Shoelace," he said. Steve tied Alex's loose lace and the fight continued.
Alex finished the fight strong and looked like he wanted to go another three rounds. The referee called the fighters to the center of the ring and stood with them on either side of him. The announcer declared, "We have the judges' unanimous decision. The winner, out of the Red Corner . . . "
"That's us! He raised Alex's hand and Alex beamed.
After removing the gloves and tape, Alex went to the judges and asked if he could see how they scored the fight. He had won by the comfortable margin of 18-7, 18-7 and 17-10 on the cards of the three judges.
In the car, as we were leaving the parking lot of the boxing arena, Alex, still in his boxing gear - he said he wanted to shower back at the dorm - punched some numbers on his cell phone. Russian conversation. At one point, Alex said something that sounded like numbers being repeated. I bet they were 18-7, 18-7 and 17-10. He ended the conversation and said to me, "I hope I wasn't rude, jabbering on like that, but I promised my parents I'd call them after the fight. They were very happy for me. I could tell that they were really proud. God! I did it! I finally had a real fight. Now I can say I'm a real fighter!"
"Alex, I believe you have always been a real fighter and I expect that you always will be. But now you can say you're a real boxer, too."
"And a winner!"
"Yes. And a winner, too."
Tom Quinn
3/10/09
Current boxing coach and instructor Tom Quinn in 1978 with his coach at Georgetown, Marty Gallagher
Former Georgetown boxing coach and instructor Marty Gallagher in 1957
Tom Quinn continues Marty's legacy -- teaching the sweet science to students at Yates during his first class of the Fall semester
Read more...
October 6, 2009
Turn, Turn, Turn
One hundred forty years ago, Georgetown students took their intramural athletic endeavors to a new level and, for the first time, began to compete against students from other schools. Thus, intercollegiate athletics on the Hilltop were born.Amidst a surge of similar competition occurring among colleges throughout the country, the principal emerging issues of this intercollegiate activity (aside from establishing agreed-upon rules for each sport) were 1) funding the costs of competing (mostly equipment and travel at the time), and 2) keeping a semblance of competitive balance amongst opponents. Not surprisingly, in this era of little-to-no regulation, the disparities on these issues between institutions could be significant and even from year to year within the same institution.
Collegiate athletics today has come a long way since those early days of student-managed intercollegiate teams. Yet, in this evolving and revolving environment, intercollegiate athletics today continue to face the same essential financial and competition issues.A recent article in the Baltimore Sun outlines a range of options that the University of Maryland will be studying in the coming year in its strategic planning for athletics. These possible choices stem from resource limitations which, in turn, shape future options for competition. They include increasing revenues in the current unstable economic climate to tiering some of its athletic programs to eliminating teams altogether.
Georgetown has not stopped grappling with such issues since its first contest in 1870. However, through the years, the University has always embraced an additional parameter, i.e., the guiding principle that participation in intercollegiate athletics ought to be a meaningful and formative experience for the student.In the past forty years, we have seen steady progress and growth both in resources and level of competition. Participation in the Big East Conference in basketball and track and field has led the way in contributing to the overall accomplishments of the Hoyas. Sailing and crew have also achieved impressive competitive success. Lacrosse and soccer have expanded their reach in recent years as well. Still, the lasting measure of success for all Georgetown teams is the meaningfulness and formative impact of the athletic experience on every student-athlete.
Dynamic forces in intercollegiate athletics continue to affect resource and competition factors. As a result, Georgetown must keep a close eye on the athletic landscape, ready to adapt to the changing environment.Read more...
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