University of New Hampshire - Manager

Justin Lang's post:

The Director of Basketball Operations at UNH used to be the head coach at my high school back about 10 years ago. Because he and my dad went to high school a couple of years apart and were friends, he asked my dad if I would like to join and work with the team when I came to UNH in the fall of '08. I told him I was interested, and I came on board when I got on campus.

At the moment, we have three (myself, plus two others). We are currently searching for another manager or two because two of the three of us are seniors this year.

I am the head manager. Because of this, I am in charge of a lot of the smaller things within the program. I work a lot with film exchange, filming games and practices, video editing, assisting the coaching staff with game and practice drills and preparation. i also go on most of the road trips (barring scheduling conflicts) and do whatever they ask of me on those.

Ideally, I would like to work in collegiate men's basketball as a coach. I would like to pursue this after I graduate in the spring. If that is not possible, I would like to try and work in the front office of a professional organization, or work within an athletic department. I want to spend my life around athletics.

I have always had a strong work ethic my four years managing. I played power forward for my high school basketball team. (I'm 5'11, 180 lbs) and always was able to defend the larger guys in the post. This is mostly because I cannot stand to lose at anything, I work hard, I am smart, and I am very competitive. That has transitioned into my managerial career as I try to get my tasks completed to the best of my abilities to keep the coaching staff from having to worry about it (as you probably know, they have other things to worry about).

I think the best game we have won since I have been with the program was probably from my freshman year, when we hosted Santa Clara, who was probably heavily favored over us. They had 7'0 senior center John Bryant (who was AT LEAST first team All-WCC that year, averaging 18.1 PPG, 14.2 RPG, and 2.5 BPG. Yes, I did just look that up.), as well as quick guards and another strong power forward (their names escape me). We ended up somehow pulling out the victory, 59-56, despte having a freshman point guard, sophomore shooting guard, freshman power forward, and sophomore center in the starting lineup (our small forward was a senior, as well as the fifth all-time leading scorer in program history). It was an incredible game to watch in person. Other than that, I would have to say last year when we nearly upset Connecticut in Storrs, before we got bit by the injury bug. That was the "Do you Believe in Miracles?" game that all small Division I schools dream of. We had a lead at halftime, but it slopped away and we lost the lead when Kemba Walker took over within the final three minutes of the game. We lost 62-55.

My best advice I could give other managers is it's like a huge cliche, but just work hard. You're going to have to put up with a lot of garbage and probably will not get monetarily compensated for it (depending on the school), but in the end, things really do seem to work out. At times, you will hate it. At times you will love it. Being a manager is truly walking a fine line. But in the end, a lot of the good outweighs the bad, and I'm sure they would enjoy it.