Dre Adams Laid to Rest

Today the funeral was held for De’Andre Adams, Winthrop’s backup point guard. All of the current team and a few former players were there and many acted as pall bearers for their fallen teammate. It was good to see that Gregg and Lynn Marshall were able to make it, and even Mark-David Vil, the new recruit from Canada. Gary McCann has a moving article about the funeral and the Herald has an image gallery.

What a terrible day for the team. I hope they’ll be able to carry on Dre’s memory and bring his energy to every game and practice.

I’m glad Winthrop will be retiring #24. Hopefully it’s the only one that will ever need to be retired due to a tragedy like this.

Photo by Andy Burriss, The Herald

UPDATE (5/22/07, 8:28 am): Here is a great tribute to Dre from Youtube. You’ll see his trademark dancing during the lineups and his rather unique free-throw shot.

Terrible News

De’Andre Adams passed away today. Please keep his family and the Winthrop team and coaches in your thoughts as they come to grips with this tragedy.

By all accounts Dre was a good kid. So often people are killed because of poor choices, but not in this case. He simply swerved to miss a tree in the road that had fallen in a storm. It could happen to any of us. It’s especially sad to see it happen to a kid with such a bright future.

Feel free to use the attached image on Myspace or your own blog as a way to remember Dre.

UPDATE (5/16/07, 11:23 pm): Former Winthrop volleyball player Beth Waggoner has written an eloquent blog post reminding us to live life to the fullest because, like Dre, you just never know when your time will come. It’s really worth a read; it brought a few tears to my eyes.

Say a prayer today…

…for De’Andre Adams and his family. Dre is a backup point guard at Winthrop who was involved in a car accident on Saturday while returning home from a summer league game. He swerved to miss a tree that had fallen in the road, flipped his car and hit another tree. He’s currently in a drug induced coma to help alleviate the swelling in his brain.

Dre is known for his energy on the court, hopefully that will help him pull through this very quickly.

UPDATE ( 5/14/07, 5:00 pm): The Herald reports that Dre remains in critical condition. “‘It’s a sad thing,’ Peele said. ‘People have to prepare, because this isn’t going to be a quick fix. It’s going to be a long, bumpy road with good days and bad days. But I can tell you he’s fighting.’”