 "Photo: Loyola Athletic Department/Steve Woltmann")
At nearly seven-feet-tall, Matt Adler spent a majority of his youth posted up in the paint on basketball courts all over Cleveland. Originally recruited to Loyola’s men’s basketball team, Adler came to Chicago his freshman year with a full athletic scholarship and a high-school record for most blocked shots in a single season.
But after being redshirted because of an ACL tear, Adler made a rare athletic switch. As he prepares to graduate this May, Adler is finishing out his senior season standing at the center of a different court — as the middle hitter on Loyola’s men’s volleyball team.
It all started during the summer of 2006, when a one-handed dunk completely altered Adler’s basketball career. The day was still fresh in Adler’s mind as he recalled the summer open gym session when he rebounded a three-pointer from then teammate Majak Kou and slam-dunked the ball with one hand.
“It was probably the best dunk of my life,” Adler said with a smile.
But as he came back down to Earth, his knee buckled out in the wrong direction and he crashed to the floor. An MRI revealed that Adler had sustained a painful knee injury commonly called “the unhappy triad:” a torn ACL, MCL and meniscus.
While such tendon injuries are common in contact sports, the triple tear made recovery a much more difficult process.
“It was frustrating because it’s such an invasive surgery,” Adler said. But after working tirelessly with his trainer for six straight months and missing 19 games at the start of his Fall 2007 season, Adler was eventually able to get back to the hardwood.
“Once I got back out there, something just didn’t feel right,” Adler said.
While 85 to 90 percent of ACL reconstructive surgeries are successful, another MRI showed that Adler’s had torn again and would need additional repairs.
“I was one of the unlucky ones,” he said matter-of-factly. While he worked to rehab his injured knee, Adler wondered if his days playing Division I basketball were over. “It was just too hard on my knees to be playing such a contact sport,” he said.
Instead of giving up on an athletic career, Adler shifted his view and set his sights on a different kind of physical sport. What had started as a joke between Adler and volleyball Coach Shane Davis quickly turned into a reality. He decided to give up his full basketball scholarship and within a week had traded in his high tops for the number five jersey on Loyola’s men’s volleyball team.
“He picked up everything really quickly,” Davis said. “He’s a big athletic guy. And he’s smart. It wasn’t too tough for him to switch over.”
During the first few months, Adler focused on getting used to the much faster pace of the game and learned how to hit the ball.
Adler’s knack for athletics made it relatively easy for him to transition from a backboard to the volleyball net.
“It’s quite impressive to transition from basketball to volleyball midway through your college career,” former teammate Nick Lamoureux said.
“Matt has a lot of heart, and he wants to be one of the best guys out there. What he lacks in experience with volleyball he makes up with his hard work in the gym, athleticism and well … height,” Lamoureux said.
Now a part of the nationally ranked team, Adler brings a big presence to the court as one of the tallest players in the MIVA conference. The self-described tall, skinny guy from Bay Village, Ohio, is now helping the Ramblers chase down a conference championship.
He doesn’t plan on stopping there. Adler, a graduate student in the business school, is also making plans to travel to Europe this August in hopes of getting signed to a professional volleyball team.
While it is common for post-collegiate players to try their luck in Europe there are no guarantees. Despite the fact that Adler only has a few years of volleyball experience under his belt, Davis thinks he’ll be just fine.
“He’s going to have to work for it,” Davis said. “But there aren’t a lot of near-seven-footers out there.”
The Bring It Tour, a promotional tour that helps place volleyball players on teams throughout Europe, takes place at the beginning of August. Adler and fellow teammates seniors Kris Berzins and Mike Morice will pay their way to Europe to participate in two weeks worth of play and testing in hopes they will be signed to a team.
“That’s the plan, hopefully,” Adler said.
“I didn’t think volleyball was where I’d end up. But I’d like to ride this one out as long as I can.”
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