Sunday 18 January 2009

a surprising profession

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketball/blog/the_dagger/post/Finally-an-answer-to-Whatever-happened-to-Kevi?urn=ncaab,134910
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So, of course, we want to know what happened to him. Is he playing semi-pro ball? In Europe? Is he ... a middle-school teacher in West Virginia that coaches high school basketball for free? The New York Times found the Pittsnogler, and has the answer:

Now, at 24, he is a middle school teacher in his hometown. He is also an unpaid assistant coach for a high school basketball team. He bowls in leagues three nights a week and occasionally plays bingo at Big Bucks Bingo. His wife, Heather, is a bank teller. They have two children and live in a double-wide trailer, and together they wonder how much appetite they have for uprooting their lives again so Pittsnogle can have one more chance at a basketball career.

It's sort of a sad story -- Pittsnogle seems to be split in two. Half of him wants to play basketball, but the other half of him wants to chill out in West Virginia, teach school, play a little bingo at Big Bucks and live out a life that writer John Branch classifies as the one "he expected and wanted before he shot his way into the national consciousness." And still, he seems torn.


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