THE STRUGGLE WAS REAL

To understand Yves Batoba today, it’s necessary to understand his path to this point. It’s a path that nearly ended before it began, marked by danger and tragedy and upheaval.

When civil war ravaged the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Batoba’s family sought to escape the bloody conflict, even if it meant leaving behind their home country and all possessions.

His parents had gone ahead and were waiting in Kinshasa, across the Congo River, but the children followed — Yves, a brother and three sisters — led by an aunt and uncle and family friend.

Yves was only six, but the incident remains stained on his memory.

“I remember all of it,” he said. “Whenever the war broke out, we were just kind of refugees for a while. We had nowhere to go. It was so violent near where we were.

“A friend of the family helped us actually navigate through the war zone. We had to military crawl, on our elbows and knees, through the war zone. Bullets and everything were flying over our heads while me and my brothers and sisters were getting through the war zone. People were dropping dead, left and right. By the grace of God we were able to make it out of those circumstances and get across the Congo River.”

They made it, somewhat surprisingly.

“Whenever we got there we were reunited with the rest of our family,” Batoba said. “I don’t know that they were actually expecting to see us again. I just remember the tears, and they threw a celebration. It was emotional, but it was only by the grace of God that we made it out of those circumstances.”

More danger remained ahead, however, once the Batoba family reached South Africa. That country had just emerged from apartheid, with Nelson Mandela in the early stages of working to direct South Africa on a new path.

“There was still a lot of tension in the air,” Batoba said. “The white people didn’t like us because we were black, and the black people didn’t like us because we weren’t from South Africa.

“It was tough.”

Yves was in the second grade and had no friends. And that was the least of the family’s problems. Their house was broken into and robbed, there were death threats on his one-year-old brother and his mother had been beaten.

“All of these things were going on,” Batoba said.

Fortunately, an uncle in the Dallas-Fort Worth area offered yet another chance at a better life.

“We actually had a family vote, whether we wanted to stay in South Africa or we wanted to leave,” he said. “Because of all those things stacking up, we just kind of packed up some stuff, left everything behind — again — and moved to Texas.”

The Lone Star State provided new hope, not that there weren’t challenges and issues initially.

“Whenever I got there, I didn’t speak any English,” Batoba said. “So you’re that foreign kid, and you hear all the jokes. I’ve heard all the jokes there are. African jokes. Black jokes. Non-English-speaking jokes. “It was tough.

“I took English as a second language class when I was going to school. Wasn’t fluent in English until I was nine years old; French was my first language.

“Once you learn the language, though, you get more comfortable.”

Comfort eventually came. And with it came success.

A friend of the family helped us actually navigate through the war zone. WE HAD TO MILITARY CRAWL, ON OUR ELBOWS AND KNEES, THROUGH THE WAR ZONE . Bullets and everything were flying over our heads while me and my brothers and sisters were getting through the war zone. PEOPLE WERE DROPPING DEAD, LEFT AND RIGHT. By the grace of God we were able to make it out of those circumstances and get across the Congo River.

On To Osu

Batoba played football at Keller High in Texas but wasn’t quite a star. He played at OSU, too, not starring, yet moving from walk-on to scholarship player as much for his influence in the locker room as for his contributions on the field.

“Yves just had such strong character,” said OSU director of football operations Mack Butler.

Batoba made an impact off the field, too, far and wide.

He thrived in the classroom, making various honor rolls, became involved around campus and with Fellowship of Christian Athletes, speaking his faith at high schools in Oklahoma and Texas, and became a voice locally, regionally and nationally through the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee, a group serving athletes within the NCAA structure. That’s where he found his calling — and a career path.

“The dude is the personification of ambition,” said Justin Southwell, a teammate and roommate of Batoba at OSU and a close friend still. “He may not always know exactly what he wants to do, but whenever he had an idea for something, he’ll put together a plan and attack it and get what he wants out of it.”

Elected as OSU’s representative for the Big 12 Conference SAAC, Batoba was able to see the organization’s influence throughout the league’s other schools. The best of what he found, he worked to bring to Stillwater and to his teammates.

“I go to the conference meetings, and I hear about what Kansas is doing and I heard about what TCU and West Virginia are doing,” Batoba said. “I think to myself, ‘Holy crap, if we could really invest into the holistic development of our student-athletes from a career standpoint and a from a leadership standpoint …’

“So I come back and I’m telling everybody what this is all about, and I said, ‘This is what I really want to go and do.’”

Immediately, he took action.

“I kind of took it upon myself to start having meetings with Big Brothers and Big Sisters of Oklahoma and different organizations there locally in Stillwater, bringing them to campus to do different events with our team,” Batoba said. “We hosted mixers within our athletic department so athletes from different sports could meet each other and interact, just understanding the importance of support from other athletes.”

Batoba enjoyed his four-year run on the football team. He rode along with some of the best teams in program history from 2009 to 2012.

Still, it’s not the wins or losses that linger.

“The most valuable part of my football playing days were the relationships within the locker room,” Batoba said. “Three of the guys in my wedding party were teammates in college. More than anything, I was able to figure out how football directly correlated to life. I always felt like Coach (Mike) Gundy did a great job of tying in life lessons to what actually went on on the football field or as a result of a game.”

The best lesson, it turns out, came from a crushing loss, when the Cowboys were upset at Iowa State in 2011. The setback came just hours after the plane crash that took the lives of OSU women’s basketball coaches Kurt Budke and Miranda Serna stunned the campus.

“We lost to Iowa State and the next game when we go on to beat OU 44-10, I remember Gundy in the locker room afterward saying, ‘Hey, if it wasn’t for what we experienced last week, who knows if we would have been able to rally the way we did to win Bedlam,’” Batoba recalled.

“It was a valuable lesson for me at the time. Really what it taught me was, hey, things may happen that are unforeseen and may hurt at the moment, but they’re only going to catapult you toward what’s next in life.

“The football playing days, more than anything, taught me how to overcome adversity in life. It sped up the maturity process for the things I was going to go on in life and encounter.”

A Rising Star

After graduating from OSU with degrees in business administration, sports management and marketing, Batoba kept charging ahead.

He continued serving out his time as Big 12 rep for SAAC, even impacting legislation near and dear to his heart as a former walk-on. In a conversation aimed at full cost of attendance at NCAA headquarters in Indianapolis, Batoba suggested that meals for athletes should extend to walk-ons. The thought was added to the discussion and later adopted.

“That was really cool, seeing not only that I had a voice, but to have it heard and to see it implemented,” Batoba said.

There was a mission trip to Kenya with Athletes in Action, an opportunity with the United States Olympic Committee spent working with Olympians, Paralympians and hopefuls, and continued outreach through FCA.

Batoba’s work with SAAC led to an internship at Notre Dame, where he served in student welfare and development. There he advised more than 70 representatives on the school’s ambitious committee, coordinated community service and career opportunities for student-athletes and also took on some multimedia duties.

The relationships formed there ultimately led him to the Dolphins.

Batoba’s work, and his life, have taken off in Miami. In March, he married Dawn Taylor in Fort Lauderdale, with family and friends in attendance. His brothers, Lionel and Nathan, were groomsmen, and OSU roommates and teammates Southwell, Elliott Jeffcoat and Christian Schroeder joined the wedding party.