Benefit will give to man who gave all
Scheidegger affected many as Sandburg AD
Life is full of opportunities, and as we go about our daily business, we tend to miss our fair share of them.
I missed one with Bruce Scheidegger, and regret it.
Our paths first crossed more than 30 years ago at the University of Illinois. He was the best pitcher on some not-very-good baseball teams, and I was covering those clubs for the Daily Illini, the student newspaper.
Memory tells me Bruce had a couple of decent seasons, and a quick check online confirms it. He led the team in innings pitched and strikeouts two years in a row, and also in wins and earned run average as a senior in 1980.
I must have interviewed him a bunch of times and written a fair number of stories about him. But that was when stories only appeared in print, so there’s no easy way to check that.
We went our separate ways and didn’t run across each other again till he took over as the athletic director at Sandburg. It occurred to me that it’d be fun to talk about those glory days, but somehow there never seemed to be the time.
Then in February, Bruce died in an auto accident near Mount Carroll in northwestern Illinois. He was 54.
It was a terrible loss for his family and friends. In the short time he was at Sandburg, he touched so many lives with his upbeat attitude and grinder mentality. I talked to a lot of Sandburg wrestlers and coaches around that time about the impact he had on their team, which was in the midst of a state-title run.
One story that stuck out was how the wrestlers showed up at school early one Saturday morning and Bruce was there to make sure the transportation was squared away and to see them off.
The Eagles got patches to wear on their singlets in his honor the rest of the season. At the individual state tournament, C.J. Brucki said, “I’m doing it for him . . . he’s always done so much for us.”
Next week, Sandburg will be giving back. The Eagles and Providence will play a boys volleyball match on Wednesday at 6:45 p.m. at Lewis University’s Neil Carey Arena. Admission will be $5, with proceeds going to Bruce’s family.
This is the third consecutive season Sandburg and Providence’s boys volleyball teams have teamed up to stage a benefit for a deserving member of the schools’ communities. When Eagles coach Sean Airola talked with his players this season about a beneficiary, the choice was easy.
Like the wrestlers and everyone else involved in sports at Sandburg, the volleyball team was touched by Bruce’s generosity of spirit.
‘‘His ability to know who is on our team and to know, individually, who they are was one of those gifts he had,” Airola said.
Sandburg is a bustling school, with hundreds of athletes at multiple levels in dozens of sports. Being the athletic director there is akin to being the CEO of a small company or the mayor of a little town.
You don’t expect the CEO to know the last guy hired or the mayor to be on a first-name basis with every kid in town. But Bruce made it a point to keep up with all of the Sandburg teams, varsity down to freshman.
“For the short amount of time he was here, it’s rare to have that big an impact,” Airola said. “It’s a big place.”
There are a lot of entertainment options out there on any given night, and next Wednesday will be no exception.
But here’s hoping Lewis’ gym is packed for that match between Sandburg and Providence. It would be a fitting tribute, to give a little back to the family of a guy who gave so much of himself to the kids on his watch.