Never Giving Up

Working as a club and intramural sports supervisor helped to expand one student’s horizons.

For Timothy Adesayna, soccer was everything. Growing up in Nigeria, he spent most of his childhood dedicated to playing the sport.

“I could remember my basketball coach in Nigeria just discouraging me from playing basketball, just because it’s more difficult than soccer,” said Adesayna. “And that’s all I did, play soccer my whole life.”

He played on his high school soccer team and hoped to play at the collegiate level. A college in Jacksonville, Florida, was recruiting Adesayna when an injury to his back the summer before his freshman year of college struck him from the recruitment process.

University of North Carolina Greensboro was his next choice. He got involved in the school’s club soccer team, but still dreamed of playing on the collegiate level. However after yet another back injury, this did not seem feasible.

“So I just kind of gave up on playing for a collegiate school and just played club soccer and also intramural soccer,” he explained.

Now a sophomore, pre-health studies and biology major at UNCG, Adesayna also works as a club and intramural sports student supervisor for the university’s campus recreation department.

“It’s the best job on campus: I would say that from first-hand experience,” added Adesayna. “And I also get to work with other students to learn what sport they would love to play and actually help them. That was one of the main reasons why I chose to work there.”

According to Adesayna, the club and intramural sports staff, as well as his other student staff peers, encourage him to continue playing and trying out new sports. In fact, he first got started in club sports when someone who used to work in the department at UNCG handed him a soccer ball right off the field.

When he moved to America, soccer was the only sport he knew, but the club and intramural sports program at UNCG allowed him to try football, basketball and quidditch — all of which he knew nothing about before playing. “The only place I’d heard of quidditch before was the Harry Potter movies,” he said. “Coming down and actually witnessing and playing quidditch, it’s a very nice sport to play. That just gave me kind of the idea to try more sports.”

But it’s about more than playing for enjoyment. Adesayna said the sport is a great stress reliever.

“It releases the stress from schoolwork and any other thing,” said Adesayna. “Every time I just get on the field to play soccer, or any other sport, it just releases my stress a lot.”

Adesayna plans to try out for the University of North Florida soccer team this January, hoping to fulfill his dream to play for a professional soccer team.

“Students really should just think about it before they take the step of playing that sport. Because once they get involved with that sport, they enjoy themselves and they actually feel fulfilled,” he advised. “Once we’ve graduated from this place, there won’t be any opportunity for us to do things like this anymore. So why don’t we just have all the fun we could have right now?”