Mississippi State wasn’t my first choice, and in fact, Mississippi State was my “Nope. Not ever. No way.” choice. There were two deciding factors in why I ended up in Starkville: cost and opportunity.

I attended East Mississippi Community College (of Last Chance U fame) straight out of high school. I graduated high school with high honors but struggled with standardized tests. I had to take a remedial ACT to get into junior college. I also had to pay for college myself. I searched the Internet high and low for scholarships, but whatever costs those scholarships and federal grants didn’t cover, I was on my own in paying for the difference.

I knew in ninth grade what I wanted to do for a career. Because 14-year-olds have it all figured out, right? I was the basketball team statistician all four years of high school and was a student assistant sports information director in my junior and senior years. I ran the school’s website, helped the athletic director with administrative tasks, and even freelanced as a sports reporter for the local newspaper. Working in sports was inevitable.

I was offered a sports information scholarship to attend EMCC, and I took it. Along with my private scholarships and federal grants, it meant I could get two years of classes out of the way without owing a dime. While at EMCC, I started looking at other schools after finishing my associate’s degree. I had only two options, and none of those schools had maroon and white as their primary colors.

My first choice was the University of Alabama (the other was Auburn). I visited Tuscaloosa and loved the campus, and I knew they had a strong communications program. I had made a strategic decision to major in communications and not explicitly in sports communications. But my desire to work in sports meant I also inquired with the athletics media relations office about being a student worker. And one fateful phone call to the Crimson Tide’s media relations office put my big dreams of attending Alabama on hold.

“Unfortunately, despite your credentials, we don’t have a space for you in our office.” I wasn’t asking for a scholarship, and I wasn’t asking for anything more than the opportunity to shadow and volunteer. And they shut the door on me in five seconds. It didn’t sit well with me and made me reassess my plan.

I was advised to contact a guy at Mississippi State named David Rosinski. David was the men’s basketball contact at State, and through some mutual connections, I found myself visiting State’s campus. I told myself I was doing it as a courtesy, if nothing more, to appease my family, most of whom had attended MSU. So, I drove the hour north, preparing to return and never think of Starkville again.

To say my life changed that day is an understatement. I only knew when I left that day that I would be a Bulldog. I didn’t realize what an influence David Rosinski would have on my life. Mississippi State offered me the opportunity to volunteer in their media relations office. Over the second semester of my sophomore year at EMCC, I spent much time in Starkville, getting a feel for everything they did. I knew most of the full-time staff well before I even set foot on campus as a student, and jumping in feet-first spurred my enrollment in summer school that July.

I even volunteered at the NCAA Division I Men’s Final Four in April 2003, meeting several other people who would become cornerstone influences in my life. And working on that one event set off a chain reaction that led me to where I am today.

When I arrived in Starkville, I came to campus not knowing what to expect. All I knew was I would say yes, take it all in, and soak up as much knowledge as possible. That resulted in being assigned as the cross country/track and field contact as a junior, an assignment I held for three years as I finished my undergraduate degree. I also learned volleyball statistics (and many opposing teams’ fight songs) and jumped in with both feet helping out with football and men’s and women’s basketball.

Here’s the thing about David, or D-Roz as we affectionately called him. He wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea. And that’s ok. I’m not, either. But David genuinely cared about the students in the office. He had been in the business long enough to see the good (hey, 1996 Men’s Final Four!), the bad, and the ugly. David was particular and meticulous, and looking back on it, probably the first time I encountered another Enneagram 1 in my professional life. There was a sure way to do things, and we did it accurately and right the first time and with integrity.

And when you messed up, he had a way of addressing it with you, so you didn’t feel like you were the scum of the earth or it was a career-crushing mistake. But you better believe you would fix your error, and no one else would bail you out of your responsibility. It didn’t matter what you were going through; he always had an open-door policy. It didn’t matter that we were playing No. 1 Kentucky on Big Monday in four hours. Life happens, and he always had an ear to listen to whatever was on your mind.

I learned a lot about doing things right from David, and I don’t just mean precisely. Like a lot of sports information directors, David had a thankless job. And he did it marvelously. ESPN announcers always had every single piece of information they could need. Our statistics were accurate because he trained us properly in what constituted an assist and what didn’t (always know your inbounder, people). And we were better writers because he allowed us to write big-time feature stories and ensured we got the byline.

My David Rosinski education culminated in my (second) senior year. I’d been the writer on our men’s basketball stat crew that first year and called the second year. David decided to give me a chance at inputting because he thought enough of me to recommend me to the organizer of the San Juan Shootout as an inputter for the event that year. That’s a big deal for a kid that’s still in school. I’m sure he was thankful it was a non-conference game, but my opportunity to input came on my birthday against Santa Clara.

I spent the entire second half sitting on press row, not inputting the game. Why? Because I had somehow given one of the teams an extra basket. I spent the second half combing through pages of code and play-by-play printouts to find my mistake. And I did. You mess it up; you’re going to fix it.

Two weeks later, I was on a plane to Puerto Rico for one of the more memorable experiences of my life. Thankfully, not because of anything I did as an inputter (although the Spanish caller that first game was a bit of a shock), but more because of a rather unusual experience of having one of our players ejected from a game and then trying to find him after discovering he wasn’t in the arena at the end of the game. The ordeal resulted in one of the craziest postgame radio interviews I’ve ever heard between Rick Stansbury and Jack Cristil.

I am the communicator and writer I am today because of David Rosinski. And Mississippi State. It’s given me an extended family that I never knew I needed and has been there for me through the ups and downs.

Hail State.

Forever maroon and white.