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Crimes Gives it the 'Ol College Try'
by Frank Burlison, Long Beach Press-Telegram
September 26, 2007
LONG BEACH - A little more than three years ago, Alexis Crimes attended
her first double-day workout with the Long Beach State volleyball program,
and lugged a backpack from classroom to classroom as a 18-year-old freshman
who had just graduated from Etiwanda High in Rancho Cucamonga a couple
of months before.
How does that quaint old saying go? Time flies?
"It sure goes fast - oh, lordy!" the affable Crimes exclaimed
recently, taking a break from a weeknight encounter with a criminal science
textbook to articulate what it feels to utter the "S" word when
talking about herself.
She chuckled.
"It seems kind of weird to refer to myself as a `senior,"' she
said. "I say it to myself every day but I really can't believe my
senior year is finally here."
Crimes came to Long Beach wanting to expand her horizons as both a volleyball
player - she'd only played the sport on an organized level for two years
before becoming a 49er - and a student.
And life hasn't zipped by so fast so that the 6-foot-3 middle blocker,
who hopes to pick her bachelor's degree - with a dual criminal justice/pre-medicine
major - in December, can't offer a some well-thought-out retrospection
about the past three years.
"In high school, I always did things because I was trying to fit
in," she said. "In high school, there are various forms of insecurity.
I
wasn't 100 percent comfortable with myself."
In case you're wondering . . . the fact that she towers over the overwhelming
majority of the portion of the population that doesn't play in the National
Basketball Association wasn't, and certainly isn't, one of those sources
of insecurity.
"I love being tall," she said. "I just wish I was taller!"
The beauty of the college experience, and not just on the volleyball court
or in a classroom, Crimes has discovered, is in learning to test one's
self in every way.
"I've learned that it's OK to fail but that you've got to get back
up and try again," she said. "Being in college opens your eyes
to so many things - you see things you'd never seen before, you meet people
. . . learn new things. It has expanded my spectrum of knowledge.
"If I'd stayed in my `little box' (just studying and playing volleyball),
I wouldn't be who I am today. But, from being around my teammates to being
in the classes I've taken here, I've learned so much about myself and
the world around me."
She's maintained the focus on the academics she had before coming to LBSU
- ultimately, she will decide between attending law school or medical
school.
And, although she was a third-team All-America selection as a 49er freshman,
she's a much more polished and well-rounded volleyball player than she
was three years ago.
She's gone from being someone whose effectiveness was limited to her ability
to soar about the net for blocks and kills, to, three years later, a player
who can defend, score and set up teammates from the back row, and pinpoint
serves.
"She's just not a `hitter and a blocker' anymore," her coach,
Brian Gimmillaro, explained. "She's improved consistently and is
still becoming a very, very good player - one of the best in the country.
But we've known that for a long time."
Despite her relatively late introduction to the sport, she understands
enough about volleyball to recognized the strides she's made as a college
player, as well as to have a firm handle as to how she is still just figuratively
scratching the surface of her potential.
"I knew Brian and the coaches here could help make me a volleyball
player and not just a middle blocker," she said. "Now, when
I'm in the back row and I come up with a dig and get the ball to the setter
. . . I get as much satisfaction out of that as anything else. It's been
a tough process but one I needed to go through."
Crimes, who'll lead the 49ers (7-5 overall and 1-1 in the Big West Conference)
into Big West matches with UC Riverside (Friday night) and UC Irvine (Saturday)
in the Walter Pyramid this weekend, has already earned as many Big West
Player of the Week awards - six - as did two-time Player of the Year Misty
May.
She'd like to help the 49ers win a conference title and make a deep NCAA
Tournament run - they've won just two tourney games during her stint -
before she picks up her degree in December.
Once that happens, she will focus her attention on competing for a spot
on the USA team that will compete in the Beijing Summer Olympics a year
from now.
Even if she isn't in Beijing, she plans to play professionally overseas
for a while before ultimately deciding what career path she will choose
- either within the legal or medical worlds.
Crimes, who is enrolled in 20 units for the second consecutive semester,
is glad she doesn't have to make that decision right away.
"Right now it would be a flip of the coin," Crimes said. "It
will be something that I want to devote my future to. In my heart of hearts,
I will know, `This is what I want to pursue."'
And she has no complaints about the path she has traveled toward that
decision.
"I knew college was going to be interesting and it's been exactly
that," she said. "I decided to become the biggest sponge in
the world and take in everything I felt I needed in order to grow as a
person."
Not that there haven't been a few missteps along the way.
She laughed.
"What's the motto, `Life doesn't always go the way it's planned?"'
she said. "It's true. But then it's not about what happens do you
but how you deal with it."
And, three years later, she's not complaining in the least.
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