My Dad's MVP

Caroline Bland

Clashing of helmets. Whistles screeching. Roar of a crowd.

I’m 8 years old, I’m with my dad and I have never been so excited. He has brought me to Airline High School in Bossier City to see a varsity football game. I’m wearing a No. 86 jersey, and I can hardly believe I am finally being allowed to tag along. As an athletic trainer, his life revolves around sports all the time, and now this is my first time to be alongside him.

After that my life would never be the same, I hope this feeling lasts forever!

My dad and I had been best friends for as long as I can remember.

“She is his other half,” my mom says. “You would not see one of them without the other.”

We did everything together, from fishing to early morning bike rides before he had to leave for school. In the summer, he would bring me with him to Airline, and we would spend all day in the training room. He had to be at the school when any team was practicing. That included six a.m. football practices, followed by baseball and wrestling practice, and ending with another football practice along with men’s basketball practice. I got really close with some of the players because I was up there almost every day. They became my big brothers.

Little did I know then that I would need them later more than ever.

It was June 6, 2010, a month before my 10th birthday. I was at my best friend Molly’s house. We had planned on staying up all night so we could make ‘Get Well Soon’ cards for my dad. He had been battling head and neck cancer for about 18 months. Around 11:00 that night, Molly’s mom told us that she was leaving to go help her friend who was having a baby.

The next day we got up and got ready to go to the movies.

It was 10:00 a.m. and there was a crisp, hard knock at the door.

That knock changed my life.

Molly asked me to answer it because she was tying her shoes. We thought it was her cousin but once I opened it, it was my mom.

“Hey Sis,” she said, using her nickname for me. “Can you come to the car with me so I can give you some money for the movies?”

I nodded and followed her to the car. I climbed in so I could wait for her to hand me the

money. Suddenly, she started driving away, and I got very confused. She pulled into the church parking lot right next to their house.

“Caroline, I have something to tell you.”

“Okay, Momma.”

“Last night I went in to check on Daddy, and he wouldn’t respond to me. Baby, Daddy died last night in his sleep.”

I was shocked. I was nine years old, and I was just told that I would no longer be able to see my dad, hear his voice again or be able to hang out with my best friend.

My dad’s death changed my entire outlook on life. Ever since then I realized that all I wanted to do in life is to be around sports. I wanted to do this because I wanted to do something that kept me close to my dad. I wanted to be able to keep his memory alive and do something that we both loved. When I was deciding on a college major in my senior year of high school, I wanted to be an athletic trainer. I chose this because it was what my dad did, and I wanted to be just as good as he was.

When it came time for me to look at colleges, I wanted to go somewhere where I could be involved with athletics. NSU stood out because it had a good sports medicine program. I started working with the NSU football team and taking sports medicine classes as a freshman. But I knew there was something missing. During Christmas break of my sophomore year, I decided to change my major.

Changing my major was very difficult for me because I thought I was letting my dad down. I thought that since I was not pursuing sports medicine, he was no longer going to be proud of me. Two days before that next spring semester, I decided I wanted to pursue a communications degree with a concentration in sports media.

Everything happens for a reason.

When I got into the communications program, I researched different females in and around sports media. Carley McCord, a sports reporter who graduated from NSU, really stood out. She was a reporter for WDSU TV in New Orleans. I have been following Carley since about 2017. NSU professor Brian Gabrial suggested I should apply for her scholarship, and I did it with no hesitation in December 2020. By September, I had totally forgotten about it. So, when I was called into the front office of sports information, I was taken aback that I had been granted the scholarship. I was going to be presented on the field during halftime at NSU’s next football game against UT Martin alongside the McCord family.

When game day arrived, I was so nervous. I was about to receive the first annual Carley McCord scholarship in front of a huge crowd. The McCord family welcomed me with open arms.

“Caroline, you deserve this award. You embody Carley in everything that you have done so far, and I know she would have loved to meet you,” said Kaleigh McCord Pedersen, Carley’s sister.

When it came time for us to walk onto the field, I started to cry. Kaleigh reached over and gave me a hug and rubbed my shoulder and said, “Don’t worry. You deserve every bit of this celebration.”

My love of sports started on the sidelines and in the training room, watching my dad tape ankles evaluate injuries. Now I’m at midfield, receiving a scholarship named after one of my sports media idols, hoping that I can follow her path while blazing a trail of my own.

After the ceremony ended, I ran towards my mom and started to break down even more. She looked at me with tears in her eyes, then hugged me harder than she ever did and said, “I am so proud of you, Sis! Your dad is right here with you.”

In that moment, I knew my other half was watching his little girl who grew up to make him proud.