Farewell Column: Live Life Without Limitations

Excuses are lame. They act as a smokescreen for those looking to dodge blame when things go wrong; they are a crutch for people who lack the confidence or the competence to be what they want to be. Whenever I hear people justify their shortcomings, I think back to a line I read in my freshman-year philosophy class, courtesy of Aristotle.

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.

I have had these words in mind with each issue of The Heights that I have edited for the past three years. Putting out the best product possible means staying in the office in McElroy until 3 a.m. twice a week to edit deadline stories, fine-tuning the copy until it is flawless. I refuse to accept anything but greatness from myself and this newspaper. As I conclude my term as Sports Editor with this final column, I hope that I have convinced you to hold the athletic department to the same standard.

The Heights, after all, is the independent student newspaper of Boston College. We are supposed to foster dialogue within this University, which we can do because we receive no funding from the school. I view it as my duty, therefore, to keep the administration honest, especially when The Globe and The Herald refuse to do so.

With the football team struggling through its worst season in over a decade, the two most prominent papers in Boston have accepted the excuses of head coach Frank Spaziani and athletic director Gene DeFilippo at face value. They have chalked up the team's record this year to injuries, youth, and bad luck. Neither The Globe nor The Herald has criticized the decisions from the sideline. Too often, people accept what they are told and look the other way.

The Heights, though, has consistently demanded accountability from the coaching staff and the administration. Seeing all sides of an issue is invaluable. If questioning Spaziani's clock management and personnel decisions makes me the bad guy, so be it. I can withstand the heat if it means holding the people in power responsible for their choices.

Above all else, I hope I have made you think. Be skeptical. Challenge what you are told. When Spaziani tells you, "We are who we are," dare him to be something greater. Setting limitations for the program is defeatist. We can be whoever we want to be. We need a coach who truly believes in BC's ability to compete with anyone.

I have never intended for my column to be negative, as it has often been perceived. I hope you have not read it that way. I think I have been tough but fair. My commentary has been meant to be constructive: This is how BC can improve. Sometimes it has come across as destructive: Here is everything that is wrong with BC.

BC is capable of excellence. Other schools with similar academic standards have succeeded in big-time college football. Stanford, Wake Forest, and Northwestern all expect their programs to be run cleanly and their players to graduate. All three have been to BCS bowls, something BC cannot say.

This is not meant to suggest that the Eagles can wake up tomorrow and be ACC champions. Success is a process, not an overnight phenomenon. To build a title contender from a three-win team will take years. Believing in the team's capacity for greatness, however, is the first step toward achieving that greatness.

In that same philosophy class I mentioned earlier, we read The Iliad, which contains another memorable passage. During a battle between the Greeks and the Trojans, an Achaean warrior named Diomedes is fascinated by a cunning soldier who fights for the Lycians, who are allies of the Trojans. He demands to know the young man's identity. Glaucus, the Lycian, responds with a speech.

"Hippolocus begat me," he said. "I claim to be his son, and he sent me to Troy with strict instructions: Ever to excel, to do better than others, and to bring glory to your forebears, who indeed were very great. This is my ancestry; this is the blood I am proud to inherit."

Ever to excel.

With the right attitude, anything is possible.