Beaver Tales

Mark Barnard spent 2005-2015 as an Oregon State assistant volleyball coach and the last four seasons as the head coach. The first topic we touch on is how different the collegiate sports system is in America compared to his home country of Australia, and Mark also shares his thoughts on the sustainability of the college sports model and how the coronavirus will alter it long-term.

I also loved hearing about his passion for coaching and his multifaceted interests away from volleyball. A "jack of all trades," you might be as likely to catch Mark reading a book about a Mexican fisherman as you would see him coaching volleyball (and yes, we talk about both those things).

Help spread the word about the Beaver Tales Podcast! If you message me ([email protected] or on Twitter @BrightTies) saying you told a friend about the podcast, I'll give you a shout out by name on a future episode!

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If you heard me talk about Food for the Hungry and would like to check out their charitable work, visit them at https://www.fh.org/.

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Another project that benefits nonprofits and should excite all Beaver fans: the Beaver Tales documentaries! Season One comes out later this year and will be as accessible as these podcasts. It would mean a lot if you subscribed at this link so you know when it's coming out and maybe get some perks that you wouldn't get otherwise! https://the-beaver-tales-podcast-documentaries.mailchimpsites.com/

Brittany Harris made the NCAA Championships three times at OSU, twice with the Oregon State gymnastics team (2011, 2012) and once as an individual competitor in the all-around (2013). The Tulsa, Oklahoma native quickly went from gymnast to coach, including a stint at Oregon State and now at D-II Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Missouri. Brittany is an assistant for Jen Llewellyn (née Kesler) who also competed at OSU.

It was a fun morning chatting with Jen (who was on episode 39) and about 20 minutes later with Brittany, who has some fun and eye-opening stories about her gymnastics career and what she learned about herself in her growth as a coach.

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If you like these podcasts, the Beaver Tales Documentaries are tailored for you: re-telling some of the best moments in Oregon State sports history with exclusive interviews with the athletes themselves, learn more and sign up for early access info at https://the-beaver-tales-podcast-documentaries.mailchimpsites.com/

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Convoy of Hope is this episode's featured nonprofit. Online at https://www.convoyofhope.org/

Jen Llewellyn (formerly Jen Kesler) was a three-time All-American at OSU and placed second in the nation on the uneven bars in the 2011 NCAA Championships. A five-time national champion in her pre-OSU career as a Level 10 gymnast, Llewellyn has added three more national championships to her resume as a coach. In 2013, she headed to Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Missouri to be a graduate assistant, but shortly after she became the head coach in remarkably chaotic (but ultimately successful) fashion. Just in the last six seasons, the program was won three USA Gymnastics Women's Collegiate National Championships and finished atop their conference standings each year. 

I had a fantastic time recapping Jen's career and hearing her story of meeting her husband, Cody Llewellyn. Similar to how OSU head coach Tanya Chaplin is married to her assistant Michael Chaplin, Jen's husband Cody assists her at Lindenwood. Jen lives in St. Charles with Cody and her newborn child.

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The Beaver Tales Documentary Series has a website! Learn more about some amazing OSU-related content I'm producing and please sign up to get email updates here: https://the-beaver-tales-podcast-documentaries.mailchimpsites.com/

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Check out https://kingdomhome.org/ and donate to a marvelous nonprofit run by former OSU baseball pitcher Matt Boyd.

Casey Bunn-Wilson excelled on the basketball court at every level: the native of Stayton, Oregon was her conference's Player of the Year three times while also starring in three other sports besides basketball. At Oregon State, she led the conference in scoring in 2007, dropping 20 points per game on Pac-10 opponents. And after college, she earned all-league honors on the Portuguese All-Star team during a pro career that took her to Spain, Ireland, Portugal, Australia and Greece.

Now, she's trying to helps others excel on the court and off it. Since 2015, Casey Bunn-Wilson has been the head women's basketball coach at Linfield University in McMinnville. I really enjoyed hearing about what Casey has learned as a coach and how different it is to examine the sport of basketball, or life, as the one teaching it rather than as the student.

I hope you find this episode entertaining and edifying -- and if you do, feel free to share it with a friend and rate it wherever you're listening!

Also check out Children's Garden at childrensgarden.ph to see how you can help this great organization continue helping kids in the Philippines to gain education and a place to live.

Will Seymore is a midfielder for the Sligo Rovers, a team in the Premier Division of the League of Ireland. A three-time all-conference player for OSU, Will finished his college career in 2014. His final victory in an OSU uniform was the program's first ever win in the NCAA Tournament. Will was drafted in the 3rd round of the MLS SuperDraft by FC Dallas and has played all over: Eugene, Reno, Cincinatti, Vancouver BC, and now in Ireland.

We talk about his crazy pro soccer career so far, what it's like to be loaned from one club to another, and his childhood split between the UK and the USA.

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Check out a great non profit: Food for the Hungry --> https://www.fh.org/

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Please consider sharing this podcast with a friend! If you can't think of anyone in particular, just send it to everyone in your contacts (that tends to do the trick). Plus, sign up for updates on the Beaver Tales Documentaries here: https://the-beaver-tales-podcast-documentaries.mailchimpsites.com/

Gerald Gregory became the best volleyball player in America in the late 1970s, captaining the USA National Team after finishing a tremendous career at UC Santa Barbara. He ended up coaching women's volleyball both at Oregon State and the University of Oregon in the 1980s (finishing with a better record with the Beavers, I might add) and after a career in coaching and teaching, Gerald retired in Nipomo, California.

Gerald and I sat across his dining room table in Nipomo to rehash his playing career, why the NCAA declared him ineligible in 1975 to effectively end his college career, and the meaningful moments throughout his coaching tenure.

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Children's Garden is today's nonprofit, benefitting adolescents in need in the Philippines. You can support their cause at https://childrensgarden.ph

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Please share this podcast with at least 30 of your closest friends! If need be, 25 is enough. Or just 1. No matter what, thank you so much for listening!

When Dick Fosbury won the 1968 Olympic Gold Medal in the High Jump, he did it using his innovative method: the Fosbury Flop. His new technique revolutionized how jumpers have summited the bar ever since. Fosbury's teammate at Oregon State, John Radetich, became the first person to set a world record using the Fosbury Flop. Radetich jumped 7 feet, 4.75 inches in 1973 to break the Indoor World Record, and three years later set another record, jumping 7 feet, 6 inches.

Radetich went on to work for 29 years at the Albany Boys & Girls Club and coached various track & field teams as well. He may call his athletic prowess "just jumping over a stick," but we talk about what he learned from his athletic career and how everything would have been different had he not come to Oregon State.

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My friend and former OSU wrestler Christian Robertson helped me set up this podcast. He has one of his own as well, called "It's All About Who You Know." Check it out on Apple here:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/its-all-about-who-you-know/id1463724633

Daniel Gomis first came to America as a junior in high school. He spoke 3 languages, but English wasn't one of them. He attended a school in Idaho with only one other African-American student. 

The 6-foot-10 native of Senegal became one of the top 100 basketball recruits in the nation and signed at Oregon State, spending 5 years at OSU that included a lot of low points (two missed seasons due to a broken leg, plus several other injuries) and high points (finishing in the top 10 in program history in blocked shots, and playing in the program's first NCAA Tournament game in 26 years).

I really enjoyed talking with Daniel about how he's finding his life purpose, his job in Portland at a French-American school, and about racial unity wherever he's traveled to: America, Senegal, New Zealand and more.

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This episode's featured nonprofit is Convoy of Hope, which does fantastic work in disaster relief and more: https://convoyofhope.org 

Sammy Harrison holds three school records at Oregon State and is the 9th and final All-American in program history. The OSU swimming program was dropped in 2019, so her school records seem to be set in stone. Even if the program was still going, they may have lasted a long time: in the 1,000 freestyle, for example, her time is 21 seconds faster than the previous record, and in the 1,650 freestyle she broke the previous mark by 33 seconds.

Sammy now lives with her husband in Stuttgart, Germany and we had a fun conversation about her collegiate highlights, how she's filling the void where swimming used to be, and protests going on in Europe.

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The nonprofit I'm featuring on this episode is The Bail Project. Their National Revolving Bail Fund provides free bail assistance to low-income individuals. Learn more at https://bailproject.org/

Dylan Pearce was playing at Southwestern Oregon Community College in 2017 without any recruiting interest from Oregon State. After sending a cell phone video of himself pitching to the OSU staff, Pearce was offered a walk-on spot. He would pitch in 47 games for the Beavers including two appearances in the College World Series on OSU's 2018 National Championship team. Pearce now plays professionally in the St. Louis Cardinals organization.

Enjoy his story of coming to OSU and his unique perspective on what was going on behind the scenes in the OSU bullpen during game 3 of the College World Series Finals!

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If you can check out the charity run by Matt Boyd, a former OSU baseball player, I would greatly value your time: kingdomhome.org

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Feel free to share this podcast with:

1) friends

2) family

3) Oregon State alums

4) Your dentist

5) The dentist your dentist had when your dentist was a kid

6) Anybody else

Thanks for listening and go Beavs!