It was late February and excitement was in the air. The Columbia basketball team was fired up. There was focus and determination.
“It was literally like before you’re playing a big game,” coach Jim Engles recalled. “The guys were just so pumped. You could see it in their eyes.”
But this wasn’t a game. Or even an actual practice. It was something as simple as an early-morning weight-lifting session. This, of course, wasn’t any run of the mill lift. It was the first official team workout of any kind, at a time when the season was winding down for most of the country.
“Everybody was just on high energy,” senior forward Ike Nweke recalled. “We just wanted to keep going.”
It was then that this coming season began in earnest. Columbia didn’t have a season last year as the Ivy League opted not to compete during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Lions weren’t able to do anything together on campus until that first day in the weight room. From then through May, it could work out with coaches in small groups. Their first official practice didn’t happen until everyone returned to campus in September.
On Tuesday, when Columbia faces Fordham in The Bronx, the waiting ends. It will be its first game since suffering a 20-point loss to Pennsylvania on March 7, 2020, a span of 612 days.
“That first game back is going to be a great moment for everyone,” junior wing Cameron Shockley-Okeke said. “It has felt like forever. It felt like ages.”
The year away was difficult for everyone. Coaches couldn’t coach or recruit in person. Players couldn’t compete. They watched the sport, following friends and former teammates. Nweke picked up yoga and meditation. Shockley-Okeke dedicated himself to his hobby, playing piano. Engles spent extra time with his family.
The team stayed together as best it could. There were weekly Zoom sessions that were focused as much on everyone’s mental health and current events as basketball. Engles organized guest speakers from all different walks of life. The team started an NBA fantasy league.
“I’m awful,” Engles, entering his fifth season at Columbia, said.
The players organized pickup games in local parks when the weather was tolerable. Sometimes, they met up for soccer or football games. Anything to stay connected.
“Just find other ways to pass that time,” Shockley-Okeke said. “You still want to be around your teammates, because there’s going to be that day when you come back and you’re playing basketball again. You want to know guys’ tendencies, how they are not just on the court, but off the court as well, their personalities. It’s good to have that time together to keep that camaraderie.”
It’s uncertain what to expect from Columbia. It was picked to finish last in the Ivy League, with such little experience on its roster. Only two players remain who logged minutes in that Pennsylvania defeat. Eight players will be making their college debuts on Tuesday. So much will be new for this group.
But after waiting so long, Engles’ team isn’t concerned about the low outside expectations or its inexperience. The Lions can’t wait to take the court together for the first time. They’ve been counting down the days.
“It brings a sense of focusing on every moment and bring passion to every moment, because the game can literally be taken away from you in an instant, and that’s what happened to us,” said the 6-foot-7 Nweke, who averaged 9.6 points and 5.3 rebounds two years ago and is expected to lead Columbia along with impressive freshman guard Geronimo Rubio De La Rosa. “It instilled something in us, where every single time we step on the court we are grateful to be there and we want to play as hard as we possibly can.”
“We just have to take advantage of every single second we step on the court.”