{"id":39552,"date":"2025-12-02T09:40:54","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T14:40:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/unitedresourceconnection.org\/cannon-ball-nd-58528\/football-will-take-you-crazy-places\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T09:40:57","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T14:40:57","slug":"football-will-take-you-crazy-places","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitedresourceconnection.org\/cannon-ball-nd-58528\/football-will-take-you-crazy-places\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Football will take you crazy places\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Linebacker<\/a><\/p>\n

Linebacker Sam O\u2019Rourke (33) on the field against nationally ranked #7 St John\u2019s University. (Photo courtesy Sam O\u2019Rourke)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

PINE RIDGE\u2014 Most high school football players are not going to get big college scholarship offers, and they are not going to graduate summa cum laude. But these players do not lack heart, grit, or as the cowboys say, try. Journalists don\u2019t write about them because they believe there isn\u2019t much there to write about, but when it comes to kids like Pine Ridge\u2019s Sam O\u2019Rourke, they would be very much mistaken.<\/p>\n

When Sam O\u2019Rourke realized he would not be a star basketball player like his brother Kobey, he turned to football. Most reservation teams are rife with bungled plays and poor discipline, but Sam was a solid presence. He didn\u2019t have to be the fastest or strongest. He had his head in the game, and a coach could count on him to do his job.<\/p>\n

\u201cFootball was always something I drew interest in on my own,\u201d Sam told NSNT. \u201cI\u2019d play with my friends outside of school. It was the only sport my parents didn\u2019t force me to play, and it\u2019s kinda funny, because it\u2019s the one I am playing in college.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like most Pine Ridge kids, basketball was the sport he thought he would play. But basketball \u201cnever worked out.\u201d<\/p>\n

When they were in the SDHSAA, Mahpiya Luta played 11-man, and they made some noise in the playoffs. But because Native schools were getting routinely mercy ruled, it was hard to get kids interested in playing. Hence, the All-Nations Conference was formed. All teams in the conference play 9-man, and only against Native teams in the conference. Sam wanted to play 11-man, and he wanted to play against the best schools.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter my sophomore year, I transferred to Pine Ridge,\u201d Sam said. \u201cAnd I was going to play there, but the pandemic hit, and that got put on hold. I ended up playing for Red Cloud again. I went through the hardship process with the state to get a fifth year on hardship. I transferred to Lakota Tech.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sam had spent one year at Mahpiya Luta under Coach Art Vitalis, playing 9-man, but at Lakota Tech he played for a fledgling 11-man program at a brand new Covid hampered school, Whatever the prospects for the team, the opportunity to face and overcome a challenge remained the same<\/p>\n

\u201cThe score never mattered to me much,\u201d Sam said. \u201cI just wanted to go out and compete with the rest of the state. My whole high school career playing at Lakota Tech, the memories, the experience, just the whole year, I wouldn\u2019t trade that for nothin\u2019. We didn\u2019t win a game, but we came close. We lost to Chamberlain by one point on Homecoming.\u201d<\/p>\n

When that final football season ended, Sam still wanted to keep playing in college, and as the school year wore on, the prospect did not look good.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a long recruiting process,\u201d he said. \u201cMy senior year ended, no interest, no offers. October, November came, still nothin\u2019, December, nothin\u2019. I ended up playing at the Indigenous Bowl at the Vikings stadium in Minneapolis. It was a great experience. Minnesota Morris Head Coach Marty Hoffmann was watching the game, and emailed me after the game and that was the first college interest I got.\u201d<\/p>\n

Morris is about an hour east of the South Dakota border, and Sam toured the campus and Hoffman made him an offer. It was an eight-hour drive back home, he was in a strange setting, in a different culture, most guys would have left after the first semester.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had to learn a lot of stuff I was never taught in high school,\u201d Sam said. \u201cThat was see-ball-get-ball, but here I have gap assignments I have pass coverage stuff I gotta know, all these blitzes. I felt like a chicken with his head cut off at first, but I love football, I love to learn, I just love to compete. I\u2019ve seen special teams time, and I\u2019m still yet to see major impact on the field as a linebacker, but I came this far, why give up now?\u201d<\/p>\n

Sam is majoring in Psychology: \u201cI had a couple of teammates who majored in it, older upper classmen, and we would have conversations about it. It\u2019s such a broad field, there are so many things I could do, I can use it to do social work, I could work in a school setting. I have to go get my master\u2019s degree, psychology major is good, but you kind of have to have that master\u2019s to back you up, to get a good paying job.\u201d<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t take much to please Sam. He sees every glass as half full, not half empty: \u201cComing here, I have a place to stay, I have a gym that\u2019s open all the time, and there\u2019s not much more I can ask for than that. It\u2019s a good place to stay grounded. It\u2019s a good place to get \u2018locked in;\u2019 as the kids say these days. It\u2019s a blessing in disguise, to get a cheap education from a good university, and as expensive as college education can get, I can\u2019t take that for granted.\u201d<\/p>\n

At 6-0, 210, Sam has added 15 lbs of muscle since high school, and no matter how his senior year at Minnesota Morris plays out, Sam is wired in such a way it will be a positive experience: \u201cFootball will take you crazy places, create bonds, brotherhood that lasts forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI did want to send a special shout out to my mom, Kelli, and my gramma, Cora,\u201d Sam said. \u201cThey always made it happen for me. Their support has always been endless, and I would not be in the position I am without those two ladies today. I\u2019m blessed to have such a supportive gramma and mother, and I love them, that\u2019s my shout out right there.\u201d<\/p>\n

(James Giago Davies is an enrolled member of OST. Contact him at skindiesel@msn.com)<\/span><\/p>\n

The post \u2018Football will take you crazy places\u2019<\/a> first appeared on Native Sun News Today<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Linebacker Sam O\u2019Rourke (33) on the field against nationally ranked #7 St John\u2019s University. (Photo courtesy Sam O\u2019Rourke) PINE RIDGE\u2014 Most high school football players are not going to get big college scholarship offers, and they are not going to graduate summa cum laude. But these players do not lack <\/p>\n

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