Since September, Ellen Williams has been grappling with a decision. The choice to attend her grandmother’s memorial service was a grueling one that she had been thinking about for weeks.

The loss brought about an amplified feeling of homesickness for the first-year player that most other freshmen wouldn’t even fathom contemplating. All season long, Williams knew that her best opportunity to play during the regular season would come against Georgetown last Friday. Ange Bradley, SU’s head coach, said so in a team meeting. But her grandmother’s service was in Ohio that Saturday.

After talking with family members and getting advice from teammates and coaches, Williams decided to stay for both the Georgetown and Dartmouth games last weekend – holding on to the hope that after 12 games she would finally be able to play.

In her 565th minute standing on the sidelines, her name was finally called. She was in, on the field, mouthpiece between her teeth, stick grazing the ground, as she defended for the Orange. It was a liberating discharge from all that she had been through.

When she ran on the field, Williams realized it was a moment she had worked for all of her life – an experience she knew her grandmother would be proud of.

‘I thought finally things were, you know, falling into place,’ Williams said with tears in her eyes after practice Tuesday. ‘It was really hard actually for me because I was really close with my grandmother. I really wanted to be there for her. I have been working so hard for this, and I know that she would have been really happy for me and I know she would have wanted for me to be here.’

Up until a week prior to the Georgetown game, after hearing the news of her grandmother’s death, Williams intended on going to Ohio to attend a memorial service Saturday, returning in time for the Orange’s game against Dartmouth Sunday afternoon.

But Williams couldn’t find flights that would enable her to travel to Ohio, ultimately leaving her with the decision to either stay there for the entire weekend or remain with the team in Syracuse.

‘I just met with her and told her that she needed to do whatever could make herself happy,’ Bradley said. ‘If she goes, I’m completely supportive. If she stays, I’m completely supportive. My biggest thing is that I didn’t want her to have any regrets and I wanted her to be able to say goodbye to her grandparent the way she needed to say it.’

Williams’ decision to stay with the Orange over the weekend surprised her teammates to an extent. But fellow back, junior Maggie Befort, and the rest of the squad were more impressed with the decision than anything else.

The junior back isn’t so sure she would have been able to weather the situation two years ago, when she was a freshman, as well as Williams has.

‘It would have been really hard,’ Befort said. ‘I know that Ellen was really close with her grandmother, and to feel so lost like that, I don’t know what I would have done. I don’t know if I could have been as strong as Ellen to stay and work hard everyday like she does.’

Bradley was happy with Williams’ play in the first and second half against the Hoyas – impressed enough to perhaps use the rookie more toward the end of the season.

For those few seconds, however, as Bradley turned her head to beckon Williams for the first time in her collegiate career, the normally all-business coach couldn’t help but switch mindsets for a moment. As Williams ran towards the substitution box and stretched and moved around furiously in an attempt to make sure her body was completely ready for her first action, the head coach became a friend, a family member.

Seeing all that Williams had endured, it was only human nature.

‘It was great, I was just really proud of her,’ Bradley said. ‘Ellen has been working so hard during the season. She competes so hard. It was just really, really great to be able to give her some game experience. To see her get that opportunity was really nice to me as a coach.’

aolivero@syr.edu

Published on October 14, 2009 at 12:00 pm