Fall — 2004
cover stories
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Eugene SykesSMC Student 1997-98,
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“I loved being at SMC. I just loved it! Playing football, the atmosphere of the place, and the diversity of the people. It all worked to bring me right up to where I needed to be.” He speaks in carefully measured tones; thoughtful and deliberate. Eugene Sykes is a guy who’s gone through much and continues to question what it is that he—and others like him—need to discover about their potential for living the ‘good life.’ “I just needed to explore other cultures and different kinds of people to see if they had any kind of similarities with my own life. Coming from where I do—South Central—we just don’t have a lot of nationalities in the predominantly black area where I lived. But we definitely had them at SMC. ” Eugene was playing a lot of street football when a couple of friends told him, ‘Hey! You’re good! You gotta go to college.’ “And I’d always wanted to go so I could get a good job and take care of my kids. So I hooked up with SMC.” As part of the Corsairs’ ‘Fab Five’ of wide receivers, Eugene racked up a very successful season and won their bowl game. Then Eugene transferred to Abilene Christian to play more ball. “But now I’m gonna transfer to Cal State Dominguez Hills and finish up my degree,” he says with real determination. “And if I can’t get into pro football, what I want to do is to get into special ed as a teacher and coach. I just want to be one of the people who can help out. I mean, kids are our future, differently abled or not.” Both Eugene and his former teammate, Chad Johnson of the Bengals, said they’d both be dead—literally—if it hadn’t been for SMC. “We grew up in gang-infested streets, and that kind of life just takes over. But I look at it this way now: There’s two doors in life. Behind one is a big party that leads to misery and jail. And then there’s another door that leads to a library. You walk through that door, and that’s the real party. The party of life.” Back |
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