EAGLES Super Fan
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Don Cook Makes the Games |
It takes a devoted fan to drive from Fredericksburg to Maine for a basketball game – even a Sweet 16 women’s national championship game. A parent might make the 23-hour drive, or a die-hard alum. But Don Cook, who calls himself the campus “mail guy,” is neither. And still, on the morning of the UMW Women’s Basketball final in Gorham, Maine, he rose before 2 and jumped in his car to be on the outskirts of Portland by the afternoon game time.
“The girls were in the national tournament” Cook, 64,
said. “You have got to go watch it – you have got to go
watch it! It doesn’t happen every year.”
At least Cook didn’t have to make the drive alone. He
rode up Friday, March 10, and back Saturday with two
other über fans, Bob and Tonia Fasick. The Springfield
couple got involved in UMW sports when daughter Elise
Fasick ’04 played UMW soccer. Cook met the Fasicks
on the sidelines, and their friendship and devotion to the
Eagles has lasted. Like the Fasicks, Cook tries to get to as
many Eagles games as he can. You’ll see him at men’s and
women’s basketball and soccer.
“But I do try to get to lacrosse and field hockey, too,” he said.
Cook, who has carried mail across the Fredericksburg campus for Pitney Bowes for nearly seven years, has been involved with youth sports since his two children – now 38 and 40 – were players. Back then he coached, laid out soccer fields, ferried kids to games and encouraged the youngsters.
Now Cook, who lives in Spotsylvania with his
wife, Diane, is rooting for his grandchildren: a freshman
club basketball player at Virginia Military Institute; a
freshman at Orange High School who plays varsity soccer,
club soccer and basketball; and 8-year-old twins who play
basketball, soccer and baseball.
Getting to most of the family games is an act of
devotion, and that doesn’t even count the effort to see the
Eagles play. “I try to get to a good number of them,” Cook said of
his grandchildren’s games. “I was up in Manassas all day
Saturday for the twins’ soccer tournament.”
As for the Eagles, he went to most of the home games
for “both the guys and girls.” And he went to a couple of
away games in Washington, D.C. But he can’t resist a good
championship game, no matter the distance.
“My previous long trip was to Pennsylvania a couple
of years ago when the [UMW Women’s Soccer Team] was
in the national tournament,” Cook said. The Fasicks were
there, too, in 2004 to see their daughter and the rest of the
team win against York College of Pennsylvania to take
the Capital Athletic Conference title and advance to the
NCAA tournament.
Bob Fasick knows his devotion to UMW began with
his daughter, but Cook had other motivation from the start.
“Don comes for the love of sports, and the kids, who
really seem to appreciate the fans,” Fasick said. “We’ve
talked among ourselves about it, and its easy to support
kids like the ones we’ve met attending the games.”
The outcome of the Eagles March Sweet 16 game was not what fans had hoped for – the basketball team fell to fifth-ranked Bowdoin College, 62-54, on the campus of the University of Southern Maine – but Cook and other supporters were proud of what the women accomplished.
“They were very happy with the season they had,” Cook said. “They ended 29 and 2.”
The Eagles are not the first college team Cook has
adopted. Before he moved to Fredericksburg from
New Jersey eight years ago, he cheered at almost every
Monmouth University basketball and soccer game. Cook
grew up in Connecticut, where he played basketball,
soccer and baseball.
But now his passion is encouraging others. He’s not
a raucous fan, he said, but “kind of in the middle. I like
to yell and I will occasionally voice an opinion about a
referee’s call.”
But devotion is what keeps him going, even when it means driving 1,200 miles in less than 48 hours. “You go to the games, you encourage [the athletes], and you stick with it,” Cook said. “I have no regrets, and I wouldn’t have missed it. I would do it again, and I hope to do it again next year.”