Episodes

Kelsey Gillespy

She was just inducted into the Athletics Hall of Fame at Indiana State University where she twice was first team all-conference, led the country in free-throw percentage in her senior year, and ranks in the top eight in four categories in the history of the women’s basketball program at the school. In high school she had been a three-time all-state, all-metro, and first team all-conference selection. In addition, she was an assistant coach for three years for a different high school, with that team winning two Class 5 Missouri state championships during her time there. She has a Master’s degree in sports psychology from the University of Missouri.  On the faith side, she is the author of a book called, “In the Trenches: Finding God Through Raising Littles” and another, released last year, called, “Real Life with Mary: Growing in Virtue to Magnify the Lord.”

Notable guest quotes:

“My mom, she was really good at telling us about Jesus and reading us Bible stories and stuff like that.  But if I want to be honest, growing up, I think sports was kind of my God.  And that’s kind of what I lived and breathed.”

“That’s kind of like my love language is sports.  And that’s the way that I find community and just a fun way to build each other up.”

“I played through high school at a really great school in St. Louis, called St. Joseph’s Academy.  And after graduating, I was fortunate enough to realize that dream of going to college and played at Indiana State.”

“Something that I very quickly discovered is that the dream of college basketball and the reality of college basketball don’t always see eye to eye.  It becomes very business-like.  And I don’t think I was quite ready for that.”

“Fortunately, I had some pretty good teammates and coaches who … helped … And so, we were definitely able to have some fun.  And the fun translated into a fruitful career, thanks be to God.”

“In college is when I started to kind of take more ownership of my faith and try to figure out who this Jesus guy was.”

“That’s when I started to really kind of open up to the idea that, man, if I’m a Christian, like I’ve been saying I am my whole life, then that means that I need to know who Christ is, right?  And not only know who Christ is but be like Him.  That’s what the word Christian really means is, like Christ.”

“Jesus can be the center of your basketball world.  And Jesus can be the center of your school world.  And He’s not just like a little sliver off to the side.  Like he needs to be the heart and soul of everything.”

“What happened through Catholic doctrine and tradition and learning so much through the Catholic faith, it deepened my roots where they were and made me so much stronger in my love for Christ.”

“Accomplishments are great.  And it’s great to use our God given gifts to excel in a certain area, but life is about people.  And people come first always, people are always more important than things no matter what the thing is or who the person is.  The person is always more valuable and to just love that person.”

“Then I had a baby.  It was like constantly it felt like a wedge between me and God.”

Related link:

Kelsey’s author/speaking website

(This episode contains a prayer by Fr. Brian Cavanaugh, T.O.R., as seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)

Dr Savannah Santiago

She ran for the University of Colorado | Colorado Springs, competing in cross country, indoor track, and outdoor track. Prior to that she was a school record holder in the 4x400m relay and earned several honors, including – among many others – being named Poway High School Athlete of the Year, and was a five-time state meet qualifier. Today, she still stays involved through a running club, continues to race on the roads, and, most recently, ran a full marathon for the charity organization St. Jude.  Her story, however, includes medical challenges, and, in part, led to her today being a foot and ankle doctor and surgeon at a Catholic hospital in Indianapolis, including treating athletes.

Notable guest quotes:

“Catholicism is something that is really important, especially to the Hispanic side of my family.  Growing up, I very distinctly remember my great-grandmother, my grandma… praying with her rosary every single night.”

“My dad had told me so many different stories about the priest from Our Lady of Guadalupe – which was our church in San Diego – coming over to the house for Sunday dinners and Father Brown and all of that.”

“The most important thing was that we understood the role of God in our life and the role of Jesus’s sacrifice.”

“I played tennis and swam and did all those other things.  But running, I would say, is the only sport that I was actually good at.”

“I had made plans to join the Peace Corps.  I had signed a contract for two years in Costa Rica where I would be studying infectious disease and teaching Spanish… I was going to run my last year of college track and COVID hit, and it just turned the entire world upside down.”

“We have a chapel on-site at our hospital … We also have numerous chaplains who are available to talk to patients.  I actually had a patient tell me the other day that he called a priest to come bedside.”

“I’ll go up to the chapel and I’ll talk to one of the priests there or I’ll just light a candle and say a quick prayer for the patient and their family.”

“I was able to help with building homes.  I actually did all of those mission trips with my mom and so it was really cool because we were part of a women build crew.  So, it was a full women team who were building homes for these families down in Mexico.”

“I think athletes tend to push themselves really really hard and I love the discipline that running has given me and I love the community that I’m a part of, but I do think that there has to be a stopping part and we have bodies that can fail on us and just because your body is breaking down doesn’t mean that the rest of you has to break down too.”

“I just feel like I have such a bigger purpose and all of those things truly did happen to me for a reason and while it didn’t feel like it in the time, I am just so lucky that I went through those experiences and got to the other side and I just can absolutely see how God’s work really played out.”

(This episode contains a prayer by Fort Worth Christian Football League parent Linda Fleshman, as seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)

Drew Mahalic

He was selected by the Denver Broncos in the third round of the NFL Draft and went on to play four seasons in the pros, first with the San Diego Chargers and then three with the Philadelphia Eagles. He was a linebacker who had played collegiately for four years at the University of Notre Dame, with the Fighting Irish being AP Poll national champions his third season with the team. After his senior year he played in the Coaches All-America Game. He even appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated magazine. During his days as an athlete, he even played two football games in Mexico City. He later received his degree from Harvard Law School.

Notable guest quotes:

“My parents were members of a Cana group where they had visitors, I think it was weekly.  They came over to discuss Catholic issues.  The big day in my life as a child was … the day I received first Holy Communion.”

“At age 11 as a member of the Cub Scouts, I got … something called the Parvuli Dei Award.  That’s going to Mass for 21 consecutive days.”

“I didn’t go to Catholic school and neither did my brother and he wound up a Catholic priest.  The public school was literally in our backyard, and so that was just a little bit too good to pass up.”

“Mary was the manifestation of God’s daughter herself.  And I don’t think that’s a stretch given how many Hail Mary’s we say, but I think her place is actually more special than we even give her credit for.  I maintain that belief even today.”

“We went to Mexico City and played… that was special to me because that’s where Our lady of Guadalupe, the image that really converted the entire country of Mexico from Juan Diego.  And that image is on my phone.  That’s my screen because I think that’s the most phenomenal thing that nobody has figured out… It’s a miracle.”

“My original ambition was to be a New York Yankee.  I was a good left-handed pitcher… I went to high school…. And they had a great football program.  And so, I wound up being the all-state quarterback and player of the year in the state of Michigan.”

“We won the national championship in the Sugar Bowl against Alabama in 1973.  I did appear on the cover of Sports Illustrated that year… We beat Alabama in the most exciting game I’ve ever played in my life. At the end of the game, we were the undefeated national champions.”

“My very first game that I played at San Diego I attended one of these FCA meetings in Houston and the speaker – it wasn’t Joel Osteen, but it might have been his dad – it was the most inspiring speech I think I’ve heard, about how we were all in blood covenant with God.”

“The Philadelphia Eagles, for what it’s worth, were the equivalent of the Catholic team in the NFL.  A monsignor traveled with us and held Mass before the games and the whole administrative staff was Catholic and it wasn’t that much different than Notre Dame.”

“A visit I made with my daughter … we just traveled … specifically to go to Medjugorje … I’m a believer that those apparitions that still occur monthly are legitimate… it was very meaningful to be there.”

(This episode contains a prayer originally from prayers-and-poetry.blogspot.com, as seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)

Cristy Murray

She is the Head Archery Coach for Holy Rosary Academy in Anchorage Alaska, having launched the program herself, and last year one of her student-athletes qualified to compete nationally. She also competed in the Taekwondo National Tournament and has participated in the mud run. Away from sports, she is a certified Catholic neurocoach and expert in helping daughters heal from the trauma of being raised by covert narcissistic mothers. Plus, she is the founder of Blue Veil Wellness, providing comprehensive online coaching programs AND she is the host of a podcast called Maternal Narcissists: Unmasked.

Notable guest quotes:

“I believe we should have faith in everything that we do, especially with sports and the media that sports is getting nowadays, it’s really a good way to evangelize.”

“I was born and raised Catholic, and then did go to Catholic school, starting kindergarten, up until like first two years of college.”

“When she brought me to Our Lady of Lourdes – this was in the Philippines – February 11 is her feast day, and they have a healing Mass.  They are like the whole day would be like a healing day.  And according to her after she had brought me there, I rarely got sick.”

“I always tell everyone I made it because not because I was strong, not because I was great, but because I prayed every night.  Even as a child, I had a pouch of prayer books with me, and I prayed every night before I’d go to bed.”

“I got into taekwondo after the military. I won state and then qualified for national championships.”

“Our church here in Alaska, they put a pilgrimage together last year and it’s to visit the Marian sites in Europe.  So, we went to Fatima and then we went to Lourdes… when I got to Lourdes, it really felt to me that I was coming home.”

“A church is not just like one person going and worshiping.  I mean, it’s good to have your time with Christ, but we’re a community and we’re there to help each other and lift each other up.”

“I also have a specific time to go to Adoration every week, which I really look forward to going to and it’s another best kept secret which should not be a secret that you hear Christ when you’re in front of the Blessed Sacrament.”

“I wanted to be a neuro coach because it’s more than just mindset.  It’s digging deeper and figuring out those neuro pathways that have been formed since you were a child that’s clearly affecting how you function in your day-to-day life.  And what’s better is if you add scripture to it.”

“Christ does not want you to feel eternally guilty and feeling bad.  That’s actually the enemy (that) wants you to feel bad because he wants you in despair, but then Christ actually is there.  He gave up his life for you and saved you.”

Related link:

Cristy’s official website

(This episode contains a prayer from the National Catholic Coaches Association’s “The Leadership Papers,” although originally credited in there to The Coach’s Bible.)

Carolina Marrelli

She started fencing in junior high, stopped during high school to pursue both track and field as well as competition squad cheerleading, then went back to fencing after graduating from college and competed for several years. After a 20-year hiatus she came back to the sport and is now working her way to getting on a national team. Along the way, on the faith side, she had been in full-time music ministry. Plus, she is a certified Health Coach and corporate wellness and women’s ministry speaker.

Notable guest quotes:

“I actually went to Mass growing up as well as the Protestant church and I went to a Protestant school from my fourth grade to my senior year.  I didn’t have much Catholic faith formation except at CCD.  I was baptized Catholic, and I received my first communion, but I stopped after that everything else, at least, the Catholic journey.”

“My dad was a fencer, and my grandfather was a fencer and you could not take a sword out of my hand as a little kid, like, fake swords.  I’d take wrapping paper rolls, I was always trying to sword fight, and my dad was like, ‘You know, you really should try fencing. I think you’d really like it’.”

“Junior high is really rough on kids, and I was made fun of a lot and fencing is where I found peace of mind.  I felt like I fit in.  Fencing is a very neurodiverse sport.  You have a lot of people with ADD and dyslexia and there’s a lot of autism and I have ADD and so for me … it was really, really great.  It’s a great outlet physically and mentally and then just emotionally because I was with people that I, you know, a little bit more comfortable with.  I fit right in and so it became my happy place.  It was really a place of refuge for me.”

“Soon as I graduated college, I joined the Baltimore fencing center, and, fencing never left me.  It was just waiting for me to come back to it.  And so, I trained five days a week with a personal trainer and then in the evenings I would go train at the club, take classes, and then on the weekends I would compete.”

“I connected with the Lord on the music like that’s where I really fell in love with church was through music.”

“I had been on a 10-year journey back into my Catholic roots at this point and when I was working in full-time music ministry, I was not only on staff at a church called New Thing Fellowship … but I was on staff there.  And then I would also go to Mass, and I was leading music for a Catholic Bible study, I’d fill in for drummers at a local Catholic church, I’d fill in for the cantor here and there.  I was playing for Catholic retreats and little conferences, and Paulina’s bookstore had me in a few times to play for some events that they had and then I’m doing stuff for the Protestant world.  So, I had one foot in the Catholic world and one foot in the Protestant world.”

“The Lord took me on this wild journey and just like, ‘I want you to start going back to Mass’ and then, ‘I want you to go to confession’.”

“I had such a radical encounter with the Lord during confession where … I was actually looking at the priest, who was super, super old … Monsignor Jude in Miami and I saw the Lord in his eyes and I just, when he said, ‘Daughter your sins are forgiven,’ … I’d never experienced anything like that.”

“In the Catholic faith Mary’s everything.  She’s our spiritual mother.”

“We’re called to be a light in the darkness and so I’m there for a reason.”

“I am working on a different way of training.  I’m actually working with a sport specific trainer once a week on mobility and agility.  I’m strength training and then I’m fencing with the Charlotte Fencing Academy … And then I compete a lot in preparation just for my goals… I’ve been surrounded by some world champion fencers that are just super encouraging and really helping me to uplevel mentally and with my game.”

Related link:

Carolina’s Linktree

(This episode contains a prayer seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)

Jose Pulido

He competed for four years in track and field in high school and present day is a coach of an evangelical nature. He is the founder of Holy Family Evangelization, a Catholic coaching organization, AND he is the author of a brand-new book just being released, called, “How to Evangelize Anyone,” which is a complete reversal for someone who was an atheist. He has evangelized at universities, Fortune 500 companies, and various non-profits in the U.S., Latin America, and Asia. He has also advised numerous organizations and parishes on evangelization and catechesis.

Notable guest quotes:

“Track and field is just one of those sports where perseverance is very much rewarded, right?  It’s just basically you racing against your past time, and I’m someone that perseverance is sort of one of my values from an early age… I also did cross country.”

“I became an atheist because I couldn’t quite grapple with the problem of pain.  How does one deal with the fact that there’s a suffering world.  And I decided you know what, things don’t quite make sense.  So why would there be a God?”

“I like to joke that I came back to the church kicking and screaming.  The logic brought me back, but I wasn’t happy about it.  Though I was in the church logically, I wasn’t there emotionally.”

“Over the course of a year, 2011, I really drew closer to the Eucharist, the Blessed Mother, Saint Joseph, and then all three together in the form of the Holy Family.”

“Around freshman, sophomore year that’s when the logic brought me full force into the Catholic church, but emotionally I wasn’t quite there yet.  And then it was at the Newman Center with Father Greg Schaefer and the FOCUS missionary … where just my heart started to beat.”

“It’s really important to both have a logical context for the faith as well as a personal experience to the faith.  I think that’s what keeps people in over the long term.”

“It was December 24, 2011, where I had a really profound experience with the Holy Family of Nazareth… it was in the Gothic Cathedral of Barcelona.”

“I didn’t just need to be in the perfect family and to feel that love.  I also needed to know that I could give love, that I could be strong, that I could also win.  You know, like, nobody wants to be part of an all-star team and be the worst player.”

“All of us at Townsend Harris High School had to take something called the Ephebic oath.  And it basically details what a good citizen of the city is.  It’s from Athens.  And the last line profoundly impacted me… ‘I shall not leave my city any less but rather greater than I found it.’  And as a Catholic it’s this, like, I shall not leave my church any less but rather greater than I found it.”

“The idea is so much of successful evangelization is to see the other person as God might, as the members of the Holy Family might… So, the litany of gratitude is, just what do I see in this other person so that I can then start with love and end with love.”

Related link:

Jose’s evangelization website
Order Jose’s book

Jamon Copeland

He is the Head Men’s Basketball Coach at Ave Maria University. He is in his 15th season as a head coach, having previously held the position at Aledo High School, The University of Texas at Tyler, a previous stint at Ave Maria, Texas State University, Trinity Valley Community College, and Keller Central High School. He led Ave Maria to the conference tournament championship game in 2021 and his 2023-24 team earned an at-large bid to the NAIA Tournament and won the program’s first-ever national tournament game. He is also a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist and a CrossFit Level I Trainer.

Notable guest quotes:

“My mom was kind of the backbone of the family spiritually and we were in Mass every Sunday, got a religious education and she just did an incredible job. My dad ended up converting to the Catholic faith.”

“I finished at Franciscan University in Steubenville, it’s a Newman Guide School, and that was actually the first time I’d ever had a Catholic education that wasn’t run through the parish.”

“Being in a small town in Oklahoma, baseball was the most readily available. So, that was the first organized sport I played, but I played organized baseball, football, basketball, cross country, track, I was on the swim team.”

“There was a really generous donor that was able to give me a substantial scholarship to Franciscan to be able to attend. It was a private school. I couldn’t afford it. And so, I just kind of felt like that was God’s will at the time. It kind of came out of nowhere; just had a knee injury, just had knee surgery, and wasn’t sure how that was gonna go. (I) got the huge scholarship and it just kind of all fell in my lap. I kind of just thought it was divine providence and took a chance and loved my time there.”

“That entire retreat I just remember praying, ‘Lord, your will be done. Wherever you want to send me, I’ll do it. Your will be done’.”

“He’s like, ‘Hey, Jamon, I just got this job, and I want you to be my top assistant. Would you take it?’ And it was another God thing… I had just been praying and praying, and the Holy Spirit had just been tugging on my heart like, ‘Hey, just be open to God’s will,’ and (I) got that call … and I accepted it on the spot.”

(in Tyler, Texas) “We were around some incredible priests, some incredible families, with an incredible bishop. And the faith definitely grew.”

“We start every practice with … a thought for the day… typically it’ll be a quote or a thought for practice for the day. And then right after that every day we have the saint of the day and we talk about the saint of the day, whoever saint’s feast day it is… and then we’ll start with our prayer and then post-practice we’re gonna close with a prayer. We do a team retreat. We go to daily Mass together on the road. We say rosaries on road trips. It’s incredible. It’s just, it’s in every fiber of our program, the Catholic faith is.”

“I’ve done the consecration to Mary and the consecration to St. Joseph … I’ve actually done the consecration to Mary multiple times.”

Related link:

Jamon’s bio on Ave Maria website

(This episode contains a prayer from the National Catholic Coaches Association’s “The Leadership Papers,” although originally credited in there to The Coach’s Bible.)