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U N I V E R S I T Y O F S O U T H F L O R I DA
Scott Tavlin’s experience as a ULS moderator
By Alyssa Stewart N E W S
E D I T O R
Hundreds of students gather in the Marshall Student Center (MSC) three to four times a semester, eagerly waiting in excitement for the University Lecture Series (ULS) to bring out their favorite actor, author, musician or celebrity. However, for the ULS moderators, that anticipation is paired with a bundle of nerves. Scott Tavlin, a student at USF, got to experience these nerves first hand when he moderated for Josh Peck to a crowd of 900. Tavlin is well known around campus for his high-energy segments on Bulls Radio, being an orientation leader, and a Master of Ceremonies (MC) for various events on campus. The student-run ULS executive board decides on the list of moderators that they feel would
see an email from the ULS office saying if I would be okay with moderating the event,” Tavlin said. “To be completely honest, I thought it was a mistake, I thought they emailed the wrong person. “People were telling me that I might have been picked because of my high energy level when I get around people.” To this point, he was correct. According to Sabrina Alt, the graduate assistant for CSI (Center of Student Involvement), Tavlin was chosen by the ULS board because he was an MC for homecoming and USF Week as well as his frequent involvement on campus. “We knew he would do well speaking in front of an audience Scott Tavlin had the opportunity to meet Josh Peck when he moderated his University Lecture Series last and there would be some week. ORACLE PHOTO/LEDA ALVIM similarities when it comes to being best connect with the speakers. This When Tavlin received the “I was doing homework in high-energy for a TV or radio could mean similar personality call from ULS, he said he my apartment and I checked my show,” Alt said. “Knowing Scott’s n See ULS on PAGE 3 traits, organizations or interests. was stunned, to say the least. email, like a good student, and I
After almost 30 years, USF men’s basketball wins a championship By Sam Newlon A S S O C I A T E
E D I T O R
There’s going to be a new trophy in the Lee Roy Selmon Athletic Center — the nearly 10-pound crystal basketball dedicated to the College Basketball Invitational (CBI) champions. The USF men’s basketball team cut down the nets after a 77-65 winner-take-all Game 3 against DePaul on Friday night in Chicago — it’s the first time the Bulls have gotten to do so in nearly 30 years when they won the Sun Belt Conference Tournament in 1990. The Bulls (24-14) were widely
projected to finish at the bottom of the AAC this season following their 10-win season. “People didn’t believe in us at the beginning of the season,” said Laquincy Rideau. “We were picked last in the conference. How could you not want to play hard if they pick you at the bottom of the conference when you know you’re better than what they say you are?” Coach Brian Gregory turned a stagnant USF team into a group of champions in about 24 months. He has rebuilt the program from the ground up. While Gregory praised his team for their grit and toughness, there was a clear message he
NEWS 3
made sure to convey — the best is yet to come. That mentality was shared by the CBI MVP, David Collins, who scored 54 points with 17 assists and 14 rebounds in the three-game final. “It’s a good step in the program,” he said. “We can move on and build from this.” Seven of the 11 teams that have won the CBI went on to win at least 20 games the next season and three have reached the NCAA Tournament the following year. USF’s roster only featured three seniors this year. Additional reporting by Brian
OPINION 6
USF men’s basketball beat DePaul 77-65 in Game 3 of the College Basketball Invitational on Friday night. After celebrating, coaches and players recognize this is just one step for the team. SPECIAL TO THE ORACLE/GOUSFBULLS
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U N I V E RS I T Y O F S OU T H F L O R I DA
ULS
Continued from PAGE 1
personality, we thought it would mesh well with Josh (Peck’s).” This is not the first time a student was chosen to moderate for ULS. In 2017, the ULS executive director at the time moderated the lecture for actress Viola Davis. “It depends on who the (ULS board) thinks could moderate well on stage,” Josh Wilson, the associate director for CSI, said. This semester, ULS began posting who the moderator is before the event, along with a biography and picture. Alt said this was created to give students an idea of what they are getting into, as well as show appreciation to the moderators who took the time to prepare for the event. “For Scott (Tavlin), students saw that one of their peers were moderating and they were more excited to attend the event,” Alt said. Tavlin said as soon as he heard the news, he began his research immediately. He looked up Peck’s filmography, such as Drake and Josh, social media and his YouTube. “Everyday (leading up to the event) I would watch his vlogs and I probably read his Wikipedia like 20 times,” Tavlin said. The moderators have the responsibility in creating the list of about 15 questions with the help of the ULS board. The questions are then sent to the speaker’s agent to be approved, according to Alt. Tavlin said he reached out to students on his social media to hear what kind of questions they had for Peck to ensure that he could cover every area of the speaker’s life. In some cases, the speakers will review the question beforehand. “It is up to the speaker if they want that in their preparation or not,” Alt said. The speakers also decide if they would prefer a regular lecture style or a moderated conversation. Wilson said the moderated style has been a recent trend for the speakers. “Itkindofshapeshowthespeakers carry their conversations because
they might be more comfortable being asked a series of questions rather than doing a presentation by themselves,” Wilson said. Alt said the moderated style creates a better flow and allows ULS to be able to steer the lecture in a direction where students will be able to enjoy. “If there is something that students really want to hear about, we are able to craft our questions in a way to get (speakers) to talk about certain topics,” Alt said. The weekend before the event, Tavlin said he spoke with Peck’s agent to create a guideline for the questions. The main concern was making sure the questions were well-rounded and not all about the show ‘Drake and Josh’ because it ended nearly 12 years ago. Typically, the speakers do a sound check with the moderators the day of the lecture but in Tavlin’s case, Peck was directed to meet the VIP students instead. Tavlin was not able to meet Peck until five minutes before the lecture started, but he used this to his advantage and practiced his questions. He said he was more nervous about answering all the questions that the crowd wanted to hear. However, after joking with Peck on stage, Tavlin said he was able to calm his nerves and comfortably interview him. According to Wilson, students are able to reach out to the ULS board if they have interest in moderating a lecture. Although it wouldn’t be guaranteed, he said it could be used for consideration. “If we know their involvement on campus, that might give us an opportunity to select them,” Wilson said. Tavlin said he was grateful to be given the opportunity from ULS and that it went better than he could have expected. “It was such an honor to even be asked to do it and have it go so well, it was a great way to close out my time here at USF,” Tavlin said. “I couldn’t think of a better way to end.”
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Student involved in accident heading to recovery
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By Leda Alvim S T A F F
W R I T E R
What was supposed to be a sweet gesture for Valentine’s Day ended in a collision involving a car and a student on a longboard last month. The accident took place on Feb. 13 in the intersection of USF Palm Drive and USF Holly Drive, when Andrew “AJ” Lazara, a freshman majoring in biomedical sciences, was on his way to the USF Post Office to send a Valentine’s Day gift for his girlfriend. According to the crash report from the University Police Department, the traffic light was green for the cars and Lazara failed to properly give the right of way to the vehicle he collided with at the time he crossed the road. Lazara was taken to Tampa General Hospital right after the collision took place. He was later transferred to the Ryder Trauma Center in Miami, where his family currently lives. After the accident, Andrew was in a coma for two weeks. He eventually woke up in Miami surrounded by his family. “When I woke up from the coma, I did not remember anything from the accident so my family had to explain everything that happened,” Lazara said. Lazara was officially discharged from Ryder Trauma Center on March 19. He will return to USF when he is fully recovered. Until then, he will stay in Miami with his family. As a result of the collision, Lazara suffered a brain injury. In addition, he had frontal and orbital fractures on his face, a broken ankle and cuts on both legs. A month after the accident, Lazara was unable to walk or perform normal daily activities. He went through physical therapy until his ankle healed
Andrew Lazara woke up in a coma in Miami after being involved in a collision with a car while he was skateboarding. SPECIAL TO THE ORACLE
and participated in occupational and speech therapy, which helped him with thought processing, swallowing and communicating with others. “After I woke up, I couldn’t talk and not even walk due to my broken ankle,” Lazara said. As a way to fundraise money to cover a portion of his medical expenses, Lazara’s uncle, Ruthu Lazara, created a GoFundMe page on Feb. 22 with a goal of $10,000. So far, the campaign has raised $6,720. “We are primarily asking for your prayers and positive energy but we would gladly
accept your generosity,” Ruthu wrote on the GoFundMe page. “Again, thanks be to God for saving AJ and thank you for your prayers and generosity.” More than 109 people have donated to the campaign to cover Lazara’s medical expenses. An anonymous person donated the highest value, coming to a total of $1,000. “AJ and our entire family are so grateful for your generosity,” his family wrote in a statement in response to the donation. “Although he is improving every day, his journey to full recovery has just started.”
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OPINION M O N DAY, A P R I L 8 , 2 0 1 9
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Students should be the drivers of their education, not admin
By Maria Ranoni M A N A G I N G
E D I T O R
USF has recently started to heavily advertise its Finish in Four plan that encourages students to complete their degrees in four years. These advertisements — which state that “Each additional year could cost you nearly $60,000!” — encourage students to take 15 credit hours a semester. This, of course, would complete a 120-hour degree in 8 semesters, or four years. Easy, right? That’s the narrative top USF administration is sticking with. As a result, students are being limited in their academic choices like major changes. Multiple students have taken to the Facebook class pages with similar complaints. Basically, academic advisors are not allowing students to change majors unless their degree can be finished in four years. So, even if a student has just decided that they absolutely hate their major and want to switch into another major that would extend their graduation date past that four-year mark, it’s unlikely that their academic advisor will let them. Simply put, USF has forgotten who pays tuition around here. USF is instead cornering its students and essentially telling them that any degree,
even one they may not love that will limit them to a field of work they are not passionate about, is better than nothing. Why is USF doing this? The answer is to keep preeminence and the money that comes along with it. In fact, certain members of USF administration have openly admitted to The Oracle that this recent fervor to increase fouryear graduation rates is to keep preeminence, which measures graduation rates as a part of its benchmarks. USF meets 11 of the 12 metrics currently. That fleeting twelfth metric requires a $500 million endowment and USF’s endowment is only at $442 million. While the prestige — and the over $6 million in additional funding — associated with preeminence is great, USF is selling out its students to be able to call itself a “preeminent research university.” The reality is students are people. And people make mistakes. They fail classes, they figure out they hate their major after three years and their goals change. Students are also the people actually paying for that degree, so they should decide what major is best for them, regardless if it takes extra time to graduate.
Not to mention, students also have challenges like having to work full-time in order to support themselves, having kids, getting sick, and the list goes on and on. In addition, some students are just in really difficult majors, like engineering for example, and need that extra semester or two to be successful. One of the biggest issues is that USF, an institution that prides itself on inclusivity and diversity, has proven it does not understand those challenges. One comment featured in The Oracle’s story about the Finish in Four policy exemplifies this. An administrator said students can get three degrees “if you tried really hard” and utilized the summer, maymester and winter session semesters. That speaks for itself. While Finish in Four was probably started with good intentions, its implementation has morphed the policy into a harmful, overreaching standard that results in students not being the drivers of their own education. USF should take a step back and consider the longreaching consequences of its policies. Maria Ranoni is a senior majoring in environmental science and policy.
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Men’s Basketball
Reliving USF’s season from a fan’s perspective By Steven Gerardy S T A F F
W R I T E R
After a 10-22 season a year ago and a roster that had only been together 16 months to begin the season, an invite to any tournament this year seemed unlikely for USF men’s basketball. Beginning the season 11-2, self-proclaimed Bulls basketball superfan Logan Semegram had a feeling the team had postseason potential. “I had a feeling that the season would be more successful than the last,” Semegram said. “I just knew that’s all this team had to do was gel, and after they started so well, I saw how much more confident the team was becoming. It was so exciting to see the progression.” The Bulls lost seven of their last nine games to end the season. From Semegram’s perspective, the College Basketball
Invitational (CBI) championship will give the Bulls momentum heading into the 2019-20 season. “I know this team will continue to grow and develop into, at least, an NIT team next season,” Semegram said. “I think there is an outside shot to make NCAA Tournament. It was just really cool to see how this young team became a family.” Led by the tenacious backcourt tandem of Laquincy Rideau and David Collins and a rising star in Alexis Yetna, the growth of fan support for the squad this season began to build as the winning continued. The Bulls had more than 7,000 fans in attendance when UCF came to the Yuengling Center. “There was a buzz in the stadium toward the end because of how hard the team was playing and how they played for each other,” Semegram said. “At the beginning of the year I was hoping for a 15-win season, then as the team
continued to win, the campus just got more and more excited.” Next season will be coach Brian Gregory’s third with the Bulls. Now that he has proven that he can take a team that barely knew each other to begin the year to a tournament championship, Semegram says it makes the fans now wanting even more. “I know this team will continue to grow,” Semegram said. “I have faith in coach Gregory to go out and get another great recruiting class. This team is going to only get better. Everyone is excited about the CBI championship but I know there are even bigger and better tournament championships in our future.” With the roller coaster ride of the season now in the rear-view mirror, fans are both excited and intrigued to find out how this will propel the Bulls into next season. The team has now had the taste of winning a championship, and
Fans line up to welcome back the USF men’s basketball team after their championship win on Friday. ORACLE PHOTO/BRIAN HATTAB according to Semegram, the Bulls should look forward to even more support from the student section. “You saw how it was this past season,” Semegram said. “There was so much electricity in the air at the end of the season
for the home games. I know the Yuengling Center will be rocking next year and the students will come out to support the team even more now that they know coach Gregory has put a championshipwinning team on the court.”
Baseball
Training and dedication helped Nick Gonzalez become the player he is today
By Josée Woble C O R R E S P O N D E N T
Most people know him as the kid that hit a home run in his first college at-bat. To start at a Division-I school as a freshman is one thing, but to hit one over the fence in his debut was another. That moment came 13 years after Nick Gonzalez picked up a baseball bat for the first time. “I don’t remember rounding the bases to be honest,” Gonzalez said. “I remember coming home, but everything was just kind of a blur. It was an unbelievable moment.” After playing tee-ball for a bit, his dad knew baseball was going to be something special. “We put him in baseball and he looked very natural,” said Nick’s
father, Carlos Gonzalez. “He was able to catch balls right away, field them and hit. He was really good.” Gonzalez was also really fast. Always being quick on his feet earned himself a nickname — Speedy. Despite being fast and having a natural ability to play the game from the beginning, Gonzalez started working with his childhood coach, José Ortega. The two started working together when Gonzalez was 6 years old. Ortega is credited with training major leaguers like Carlos Gonzalez, Sandy Leon, Alberto Gonzalez, Gerardo Parra, Ender Inciarte, Adrian Sanchez and dozens more in the minors. By the time Gonzalez got to high school, he was already fully invested
in improving his performance as a player. He spent countless hours practicing because he knew it would pay off one day. “No kidding, he would practice six or seven days a week since he was 8 years old,” Carlos said. “He wanted to get better. He wanted to make it. “A lot of kids take summer breaks and go to the movies, but Nicholas missed out on all of that,” Carlos said. “He would go fishing with me whenever we could, but it was always baseball.” Gonzalez attended Alonso High School in Tampa. It’s also the same school where 2017 College World Series MVP pitcher Alex Faedo and late Miami Marlins pitcher José Fernandez played. While Gonzalez spent his
freshman and sophomore years training with Ortega, he decided to try out for the school’s team his junior year. He played on the varsity squad his final two years in high school. Gonzalez stands at 5-feet 9-inches, so he’s not the tallest or biggest player on any field. His dad knew that proving his ability beyond his physical appearance would be a challenge. “We knew, as parents, that he had the potential,” Carlos said. “But again, because of his size, he always had to prove beyond any doubt to any coach that every time he steps on the field, he can play as good as anybody … Now, it’s like his job. He competes and proves every single time he goes out on the field that he can be the best he can.”
Now, 13 years after picking up his first baseball bat, Gonzalez is starting most games at shortstop for USF. Sitting in the same seats at every home game are his parents, Carlos and Maria. You can usually see them there at least 30 minutes before first pitch and his dad is always sporting a gray USF jersey with ‘Gonzalez’ written on the back. “It means a lot. It’s always nice to have that support. My mom and dad have been my No. 1 supporters for forever,” Gonzalez said. “You know they’ve been to every single practice, every single game and that support is just unbelievable.” For a longer version of this story, please visit www.usforacle.com.