Episodes

Luke Vercollone

He played 15 years of pro soccer, having retired last year from the United Soccer League after having initially been drafted into Major League Soccer.  He had played the sport collegiately at Seton Hall University (a Roman Catholic university).  Although he founded a program that teaches basic soccer skills to kids, he is now working for a pro-life organization.  He is also in the Knights of Columbus and has started a men’s ministry.  He also has a faith-based line of apparel.

Notable guest quotes:

“I was so blessed to be raised in the faith, growing up, but, it was often more of my parents’ faith and that comfortable environment where I was surrounded by it than it was my own personal faith.”

“He lived it.  He lived the faith fully and he had peace and he had something that I wanted… He was… a likeable, relatable person who practiced the faith… and I told him what I wanted and he said it can be done… in giving God all of my life and not just trying to hold onto parts of it.  It really transformed my life.”

“But the balance is always tough.  I mean, where do you get your identity?  And for me, sometimes I would get it in soccer and find fulfillment in succeeding in soccer, but I knew that it had to come from God and from God alone.”

“What helped a lot me was that relationship through prayer.  And just by prayer, on campus I would pray for 15 minutes a day, my senior year… in front of the tabernacle.  In the sacraments – prayer and the sacraments are just so powerful with that personal relationship with God.”

“That identity and that discernment in prayer, in sacraments, and understanding that to do God’s Will doesn’t mean that I can’t do the desires of my heart.  So, that prayer really helped a lot.”

“As I was discerning retirement with pro soccer, I felt a strong calling to ministry and towards evangelization.”

“So many great saints in our tradition that we get to learn from, be inspired by, and have them intercede for us, so, we are grateful that they’re praying for us daily.”

Related links:

Save The Storks
Mighty Kicks
Luke’s apparel line

Tanner Kalina

In college he played Division I baseball and was being scouted by the New York Mets, going on to play at another college before eventually made his way out of the sport.  He remains an avid surfer and has also found success in comedy and films, including a movie released earlier this year that he says is, “Littered with Catholicism.”  He and a friend are also going around college campuses giving talks, which was spawned from his having participated in FOCUS.

Notable guest quotes:

“Sister Ruth was kind of training me in what being a Catholic looks like.”

“In middle school I’d walk myself to Mass and make sure I was in the pew every Sunday.”

“I have peace about it, and I’ve forgiven them, but, one of them came up to me after my time at HBU and said that they tried to break me.”

“It kind of presented a bit of a spiritual crisis too because I saw everything I had worked for so hard and diligently my whole life, everything I wanted, and everything I felt God wanted me to do just kind of falling through the cracks of my clutch and it made me just see that kind of my whole identity was wrapped up in being a shortstop, being a professional ballplayer, and so I was kind of forced to confront that, lean into God.”

“When I went to UT, the first stop I made was at the university Catholic center.  And, the first person I ran into was a FOCUS missionary and she immediately got me involved with a Bible study there.  Which, that Bible study became my community and still some of my best friends.”

“Authentic walks are possible.  Authentic relationships with God are totally real.”

“I feel my vocation is to bridge the sacred and secular.”

“Your plans are not your plans, and your plans aren’t gonna work out.  But just kind of have fun in the freefall that is the walk with God.”

Related link:

Tanner’s IMDB page

(This episode contains a prayer originally excerpted and adapted from Day By Day: The Notre Dame Prayerbook for Students by Thomas McNally, as seen in Play Like A Champion Today’s prayerbook for sports, God, Be In My Sport)

Matt Biondi

He has been a sports TV anchor and sports reporter in Seattle and many other markets, and he has been a sports radio host.  He even still does some work for media outlets that need him for the visiting teams that come in to play the Seattle Seahawks.  He has two daughters, one of which just finished a four-year scholarship in golf at a Catholic college in southern California.  Matt himself played football in high school.

Notable guest quotes:

“Watching these athletes on a day-to-day basis and where is their faith as it relates to all the fanfare they get, and they’re really put on a pedestal for so many years.”

“You’ve gotta stay sort of cemented with your feet firmly on the ground as it relates to just focusing on your job and your faith and not thinking that you’re better than the next person.”

“Sports, for fans in Philadelphia and other markets I’ve covered, it’s a real passion and it’s a generational thing, passed down from families.  And so, where does faith end up on a Sunday afternoon at 1:00?  Unfortunately, sometimes in their back pockets instead of foremost in their mind.”

“Faith can be our greatest attribute when we can balance life a little bit, because we actually – to me anyway – we further understand more the importance of faith when you do have some balance in your life.”

“Those that wanna pursue the Lord and pursue God as their number one thing in life, I mean, they will do that no matter what the circumstances.  The ones that are on the fence sometimes need a little guidance.”

“I saw enough of these athletes where, and I talked to a lot of ’em, where their faith was a central part of their life … They understand that difference between what’s on the field and how close they are with their faith.”

“When you get rejected in something… you have to fall back on something and that’s another reason why faith comes into our lives on a daily basis, because our lives are filled with rejection.”

“I couldn’t wait for the next challenge, the next adversity day to show up, because I knew deep down that (God) had my back.”

“God has me on this earth to serve Him and that’s in the bond with my children.”

Related link:

Matt’s company

Megan Landry

Finished her softball career at Nicholls State University (in Louisiana) as the program’s all-time leader in victories, following a career at Central Catholic High School in which she played three sports, which included (as a pitcher in softball) over 1,000 strikeouts and multiple no-hitters.  In high school she was a leader of Sisters in Christ and Retreat Team Leader.  And, in college she was leading a Bible study as early as her sophomore year.  Since graduating from Nicholls State University, she has become an on-campus missionary elsewhere.  In this interview Megan also talks about how tearing her ACL became a wake-up call for her as well as the challenges she faces in where she is and what she’s doing now.

Notable guest quotes:

“I was burning out toward the end of my high school career.  So I was questioning, not only doubtful, ‘Am I good enough to play in college,’ but I was also doubtful of, like, do I even want to play in college.  Am I getting tired of sports?  Am I overdoing it?”

“Tearing the ACL was definitely a blessing in disguise.”

“It was a complete identity crisis.  One day I was an athlete going to all these practices one after the other.  And the next day I have nothing to compete about.”

“Throughout the rehab process it was definitely a time that I ran to Jesus.”

“He was rewarding me for my outside – my faith, really – so that was really cool to experience in my freshman year.”

“God just worked through the situation that I was thrown into.”

“I would ask my coach ahead of time, ‘Hey coach, is it okay if my parents come pick me up from the hotel room, bring me to Mass, bring me back.  I promise I’ll be on-time for breakfast’.”

“(coach) understood how important Mass, the sacrament, Bible study, Jesus, was to us.”

“It is literally my job to serve the female athletes… and show ’em Jesus, bring ’em to Jesus, bring ’em to the one who will actually satisfy their hearts, and teach ’em how to glorify God through their sports, through their workouts, through everything they participate in.”

“I’ve literally lost all my cool-ness points being a missionary, but honestly that’s the perfect place to be in because it allows Jesus to do the work.”

“THE number one priority in my day is to remain in Jesus.”

“Sometimes one hour with Jesus is just not enough.  We have to go back to adoration at night.”

Megan’s missionary work website

Dr Kelly Morrow

Fans taking sports too seriously.  Parents being WAY too involved in their son or daughter’s sports.  Superstitions that fans carry out.  Sports betting.  Hear about these and other issues from a professional and spiritual perspective via the Clinical Psychologist at Saint Paul VI Institute in Omaha, Nebraska, where part of her work includes meeting with priests, religious, and lay men & women who are seeking faith-based counseling.  With a sports background herself, she also works with seminarians attending the Institute for Priestly Formation and conducts psychological evaluations for individuals interested in entering seminary, the deaconate, or religious communities.  She is a member of both the Catholic Psychotherapy Association and the Catholic Medical Association.

Notable guest quotes:

“I come from a mind, body, spirit perspective, and, we know that the evil one loves to take advantage of our weaknesses, but also the situations we find ourselves in.  And, when he sees faithful Catholics becoming overly obsessed with what’s happening in a game that’s supposed to be for fun and enrichment and community building, and instead it’s causing division, he’s thrilled.  He loves to take advantage of opportunities for pride to rise up to the surface.”

“If we’re aware of our vulnerability for (Satan’s) influence… we can engage the community – here on earth as well as in heaven – the saints and the angels and our fellow Christians to help us to combat that and to reject those temptations to let our emotions go wild whenever we’re watching sports or even playing sports.”

“It’s hard as a parent, or as a fan, to sit on the sidelines because we identify with our loved one who’s playing or the team… We often talk about ‘We’re winning,’ ‘We lost,’ and that identification helps us to feel as though we’re playing in that game.  The problem with that from a psychological perspective is that I have no control as a fan over what’s happening on the court or on the field.”

“There actually can be real life consequences to games, and in that, you need to check and say, ‘Okay, is this game becoming the most important thing in my life right now?  Is it more important than my loved ones that are here?  Is it more important than the reputation I have with these other people that are here?  Is it more important than my faith in God’?”

“I think as a Catholic it’s good to just remind our fellow Catholics, ‘Hey, the church does not agree with superstition.  And I know you think it’s just for fun, but I want to challenge you to not wear that shirt today’.”

“(my husband) is the calm parent.  I’m the one who often times will leave the game and go pray a rosary.  And actually, that’s a good stress management technique too, because it puts things back into perspective.”

“I find that if I need to get away to put things back in order and to make sure that God is first and center in my life, a silent retreat is the best way that I’ve found to do that.”

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

Sue Medley

Fifteen years ago she was told by doctors that she had six months left to live!  She was the Head Volleyball Coach at Saint Mary’s College in Indiana, then moved on to be the Assistant Volleyball Coach at Kansas State University, and then was the Head Coach at Cornell University before moving on to the University of Maine where she established the first NCAA Division I volleyball program in the school’s history.  She is also the founder of the Maine Volleyball Coaches Association, and in USA Volleyball’s Iroquois-Empire Volleyball Association Region she serves as Director and Head Coach of the High Performance Volleyball Program there.

Notable guest quotes:

“In athletics I think all of us are somewhat tempted.  It’s a very insular type of world.  You can very easily live your days based on a competitive schedule, a practice schedule, and wins & losses… You’re giving your best effort but at the end of the day those things are not really what we’re here for.”

“I have always kind of felt that, regardless – win, lose, or draw – my faith and my relationship with God will always be the bedrock of what I do.”

“I want to be somebody that students can come to, my fellow coaches would approach, when things get tough.  And when things get tough you need the Lord.  You need Him in good times but you really need to know you have Him in bad times.”

“That’s really been my approach, is to try to love my neighbor as myself… Because I think with love you keep a door open.  Sometimes I think with proselytizing and speaking we can sometimes close doors.”

“I think as a Christian we have an extra duty to walk our walk and not just talk our talk.”

“The opportunity for me to attend the University of Notre Dame is one of the greatest blessings that has happened to me in my life for sure.”

“The greatest gift that Notre Dame gave me was just the strengthening of my faith and the demonstration and just daily living of people who lived their faith out in their daily actions.  So, it’s a place I think about just about every day of my life.”

“In that time period (dealing with health issues) I really leaned on the Lord to show me the way out because I knew that He had a different plan for me than what the doctors had.”

Bill Hogan

Currently at St. Joseph’s College in Indiana, his alma mater, he previously was the Director of Athletics for ten years at Seattle University after having held the same position for 15 years at the University of San Francisco, both of which are Jesuit schools.  Before all that he was the Athletic Director (and was even the basketball coach) at St. Joseph’s, where he had played basketball during his college days.  Active with the Knights of Columbus, he also served on the Executive Board in Seattle for the Special Olympics and was part of the decision to host the 2018 Special Olympics USA Games there.

Notable guest quotes:

“We have probably the most beautiful grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes on our campus as you’ve ever seen.  It was done by the seminarians back in the, I think, late 1800s or early 1900s, and is still stunning, and it’s a great place for reflection and spiritual awakening and just a wonderful, beautiful, spot.”

“I try to exercise every day by walking – a 35, 40-minute walk – and I always stop by the grotto to say a quick prayer, almost every day.”

“I went to Catholic grade school, Catholic high school, Catholic college, and I’ve worked the last 35 years at Catholic universities.  There’s something special about being devoted and… I enjoy that a lot, it just fits me.”

“I feel very privileged to have had this long experience in Catholic higher education.”

“You would get chills listening to his homilies.”

“In Seattle they had a chapel on campus that’s world-renowned.  It’s one of the top 25 – I saw it in a book – it’s one of the top 25 religious houses in the world, because of the architecture.”

“We were fortunate enough to make it to the national championship in 1974… But… I don’t remember even hearing anything about a steroid or anything like that, enhancement-type things… You didn’t have the type of things that are going wrong now back then.  It was a much more pure existence, it seemed like.”

“I always seem to end up where I can do the most good.  And it’s not always my choice.  I think the Virgin Mary, when I was five years old, I was the guy in charge of the ceremony, the May Day, at St. Ann parish in Hamilton, Ohio, and she has always been there with me… So, it was, trying to do the Will of God and doing the best you can.”

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