I remember it so clearly. I was sitting in my room, fingers wrapped in a death-lock around my phone, constantly swiping down on my Twitter feed. A satisfying series of that shwooo-buh sound—the little jingle that plays every time you refresh—kept time with my swipes.



It was draft day. I had played a good senior season and my team had made it pretty deep in the NCAA tournament. I had already decided that if I didn’t get drafted, I would enter a preseason camp and try out. Maybe that was a defense mechanism, telling myself that whether or not I got drafted, my dream would live on.



The first five picks were predictable. Swipe. Scan. Swipe. Scan. I sat anxiously as the picks climbed. I knew I wasn’t going to go in the top 10, but after that? You never know. Between last-minute trades, timeouts, and breaks between picks, I sat there for what felt like ages. I got up and moved around. I walked out my door and headed to the campus track. Round One...