It’s strange how the littlest things can leave the biggest impressions on you. Sometimes I feel like it’s the details, the tiny elements of your day that can mean the most when all is said and done. I know this thought seems out of place in a basketball preview section, when we’re supposed to be talking about seedings and rankings and brackets and such. But I promise, it will all make sense.

I was sitting in Moonstruck the other day, and a conversation I overheard led me to a strange sort of deeply reflective moment. I was at the coffee shop fairly late trying to write a paper. I was worrying about tests and projects and how I was going to get it all done before break, and was feeling extremely stressed out. We’ve all been there. We’ve all been at that point of no return, when you think you’re going to have a complete meltdown and just quit school, never get out of bed, refuse to take any more. I was at that point, sitting in Moonstruck drinking a somewhat disappointing raspberry iced team, and suddenly this conversation made me realized I would be able to get out of bed after all.

Two seniors (I assume they were seniors) were sitting at a table near mine. One asked the other what he was doing for spring break, and the first said that he had no plans, but would be going home to see his family. They then began chatting about spring break and how neither had ever gone somewhere like Cancun or South Padre.

“There are two things I regret not doing in college,” the first said to the second. “I never went on a road trip. And I never went to an away basketball game.”

My first emotion upon overhearing this was a pang of sadness for the speaker. I can’t imagine going through college without a road trip. And I certainly cannot imagine being here four years, being a basketball fan, and never going just as far as Indiana or Northwestern to take in a game.

For me, the past three years – and especially the last two – have been a cross-country journey through the world of college athletics. My first Illini road trip was to the Purdue basketball game in 2004, when Luther Head sunk “the shot” to win his team a share of the Big Ten title. We packed five people into my friend’s Jeep and hit the road, and while it was a cramped car ride, it was one of the best games I’ve ever been to. I still remember looking down on the court and laughing at Gene Keady’s comb over, running across campus to meet up with friends from high school, and hugging the girl next to me in ecstasy when the basket counted and we won the game. I think that was the moment I was hooked. And what an adventure has followed.

I’ve taken dozens of road trips since starting college, going everywhere form California to North Carolina to Oklahoma. I’ve driven through the Ozarks in the fall and through northern Michigan in the winter. I took a 36-hour bus trip to Washington, D.C., spent Reading Day in Portland, Ore., and sought ways to entertain a 22-year-old sports-junky male in the Mall of America. When I look back on college, my years at Illinois will likely be defined by the road trips I took and the people I sat next to on the journey.

Today, as you’re reading this, I am on my way to San Diego for what might just be my last road trip with the Illini. The plan is to be back in Champaign for grad school next fall, but there’s no guarantee that will happen. I might not be in Memorial Stadium on Sept. 3, might not get to spend another season on the sidelines at a basketball game, may not get to beg my bosses for money we don’t have so I can drive to the middle of nowhere for a story people don’t know they need to read. This could be it.

The greatest memories I have are of eating White Castle in Indiana, duct taping the bumper back on a car in Missouri and searching for Deron Williams gear at the Salt Lake City airport (sadly, there was none). I’ve run the bases on the Twins’ field, stood at center court where Michael Jordan became His Airness and debated whether anyone would buy Erin Andrews’ leftover M&Ms; if we sold them on eBay (I’m told there’s a market – but I have trouble believing that). I’ve been to 10 of the 11 Big Ten campuses, hit four time zones in less than two weeks, and met some of the biggest names in college basketball. And they paid me – very meagerly – to do it.

Sitting in Moonstruck that day, I realized that my hectic life isn’t really so bad. But I realized something that is probably more important, and which probably won’t bore you as much. College is about more than classes and bars, although those are two very dominant themes at Illinois. It’s also not about sports, although people like Dee Brown and those guys in the orange sherbet-colored suits might fight me on that one. College is about finding yourself.

My Moonstruck neighbor may never have gone on a road trip, but I’m sure his college experiences is full of memories people like me can never dream of. I was never in a sorority. I was never a James Scholar or the president of any club, except maybe on Facebook. For me, finding myself happened at 57 East Green Street, in Assembly Hall, at Memorial Stadium, in North Carolina, at the Salt Lake City airport and well, you get the idea.

Illini sports have made me who I am. Illini sports have defined me in a way I could never have otherwise imagined. I’m not Dee Brown or Red Grange. I did nothing to change the face of Illinois athletics. But man, have they changed me.

Courtney Linehan is a senior in Communications. She can be reached at [email protected].