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19

Oct, 2018

Surprise, Surprise: Brower and Staples Rewarded Scholarships in Creative Fashion

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Corey Staples and Stephanie Brower always wanted to be Gators.

Staples comes from a long line of Gator lineage. Her cousin Patrick Miller played linebacker for the Gators from 1982-85 and is currently the head football coach at Gainesville High School. Another cousin, Reggie McGrew, played on the defensive line for Steve Spurrier from 1996-98 before being selected in the first round of the NFL Draft by the San Francisco 49ers. Her cousin Nina (Foster) McGrew was an All-American volleyball player at UF in 1996-97. Her cousin Pamela Stone played basketball from 1981-83. Her stepfather, Michael Brandon, played football from 1988-91.

Most recently, her brother Matthew graduated from UF in the spring of 2017.

"I would like to say I bleed orange and blue," Staples said.

58534 — Corey Staples is the latest in a long line of family remembers with ties to the Gators. (Photo: Piper Hansen/UAA Communications)

Meanwhile, Brower was drawn to UF by the school's academic prestige. Her brother also attended the university. She dreamed of one day playing for the Orange and Blue.

They took different paths filled with adversity, but they both walked-on to the women's basketball team for the 2017-18 season. Less than a year later, they've gone a step further. Coach Cam Newbauer placed both of them on scholarship recently.

"I've always believed that there's value in having people that want to be at your school," Newbauer said. "There's no price on that when you grow up wanting to be at a certain place and then when you have that opportunity, the amount of effort and passion that they put into it, earn them the right to get the scholarships. It's really cool to get to celebrate such a special moment with them."

Brower, a forward, averaged 12.1 points per game over her four-year career at Wiregrass Ranch (Fla.) High School. During her senior season, she averaged a double-double of 15.1 points and 10.4 rebounds per game. She was named to the Tampa Bay Times' All-Tampa Bay First Team.

However, she headed to UF in the fall of 2017 as a health science major, thinking her playing career was over.

Newbauer said Brower attended one of his camps when he was the head coach at Belmont, but he didn't have a spot for her. However, when he took over the Florida program in March 2017, he found a team sorely lacking depth. So, when Brower reached out to him about walking on last December, it was a no-brainer.

"I guess there was part of me, too, that kind of held on to that dream like maybe there's this slight opportunity," she said. "So, I kind of went for it, and it worked out."

Brower, now a sophomore, logged 45 minutes, including a career-high 24 against Tennessee on Feb. 22. Against the Vols, she scored her first career points and tied for the team lead with three assists. She is one of only three players on the 2018-19 squad who played in a game in a UF uniform a season ago.

Brower told Newbauer that football coach Dan Mullen had visited the Delta Zeta sorority, of which she is a member, to drum up support for his team. She invited Newbauer to do the same.

At this point, Newbauer and his staff had already made the decision to award her a scholarship, but they were looking for a creative way to surprise her. Unbeknownst to her at the time, Brower had given him the perfect idea.

Newbauer called Brower to stand in front of the group and asked for the crowd to applaud one of their sorority sisters. After the cheers quieted, he said it again, only this time he asked them to applaud a member of the sorority who had earned a scholarship.

Brower's parents had been told about the scholarship previously, so they showed up at the sorority as part of the surprise.

"I was completely taken off guard, totally shocked," Brower said. "They really surprised me with it. It was an amazing feeling to feel so much support and love from my coaches and my team. I'm really grateful for the opportunity as well."

Meanwhile, Staples, a redshirt junior guard, was awarded a scholarship in July without ever playing in a game for the Gators.

"I think that goes to show who she is as a person and what we believe in her and just knowing the time she's already put into this and her efforts and enthusiasm for Florida and for the program," Newbauer said.

She was named to the Georgia All-State Team and won the 4A state championship as a senior at Buford High School. As a high school sophomore, she verbally committed to play for the Gators as a preferred walk-on. However, after she graduated from high school, she couldn't get into UF. So, she was forced to take a detour to junior college.

She began her college career at Santa Fe College in Gainesville, where she was named Mid-Florida Second Team All-Conference as a sophomore in 2016-17. While at Santa Fe, she received scholarship offers from Florida A&M and Hartford, among other schools. But her decision was obvious.

"Nothing was going to ever beat being a Florida Gator," Staples said. "So, even if that meant walking on, I was really willing to take that risk.
"Now being here and earning that scholarship is really just like the icing on the cake. It's the most incredible feeling."

Staples enrolled at UF in June 2017. Due to depth issues, she would've played in 2017-18. How much she would play was still to be determined.

Unfortunately, she never found out. On the first official day of practice last fall, Newbauer wasn't pleased with one of his player's effort in a drill. So, he made her do it again alongside Staples. Staples tore her left ACL during the drill and was out for the season.

"It was rocky for her mentally and physically and then just not being able to travel with us," Newbauer said. "But then as the year went on, you saw her become this incredible cheerleader for her teammates on the bench and during games and at practice and encouraging and creating energy, which was really cool to see."

In July, GatorVision followed Staples around with cameras on a scavenger hunt, and she thought she was filming a recruiting video. Instead, she was caught off guard with a scholarship at the end of the scavenger hunt.

Staples said there is no secret to her success. It's just good, old-fashioned hard work.

"Not just in basketball but being able to show that you're a good student and outside in the community and things like that," she said. "Also, recovering from my ACL, I think [the coaches] just saw the therapy and the rehab going well and me pushing myself to the max."

Newbauer said his decision to announce the scholarships in dramatic, creative and ceremonial ways stems from a book he and another staff member read over the summer. The book is titled "The Power of Moments: Why Certain Experiences Have Extraordinary Impact" by Chip and Dan Heath.

"The whole point of the book is talking about how you can make impacts in people's lives through being creative with moments," he said. "That book really hit me. Working with young people, you want these times to be sacred to them and special. So, we just tried to think of something unique and creative that would make a lasting impression for their teammates and for them and for our fans in Gator Nation because they're all part of this.

"I believe in the power of moments, and I thought those were pretty cool moments that we were trying to make a big deal for them because we knew how big a deal it would be for them."

Newbauer was clear to point out, however, that awarding them scholarships was not an act of charity. Brower and Staples earned it.

"Our locker room, on the court, the passion they bring everywhere being a Florida Gator, the sacrifice they put in last year as being part of this team," Newbauer said. "It's kind of like, what don't they do?"

Staples said there's no time to relax now that she's on scholarship. She still has work to do.

"Still working to be able to contribute to the team, give them good minutes, give them solid play, things like that," she said.

Newbauer said he cried in the days leading up to the scholarship announcements at the thought of what the scholarships would mean to Brower and Staples. They have defined part of what he wants his program to be about.

"When you're a coach at a program, you want players to work hard naturally," he said. "You want them to fight. You want them to earn it. For those two to come in here as walk-ons and to fight and earn this opportunity was really cool to watch, just to see the passion that they had on a daily basis."

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