Shortly after being offered one of USA Rugby's first 7s contracts, Cal alum Blaine Scully tore his achilles tendon. With resilience in the face of extreme adversity (a trait that appears to run in the family), Scully has been spending time at the SAHPC and on the Cal rugby sidelines as he works to return to rugby.
After a few weeks recovering from surgery, Scully left the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, Calif., to return to Berkeley. Billups, a certified strength and conditioning coach, crafted a specialized day-by-day training regimen and set Scully up with a physical therapist in the Cal sports medicine department. All efforts were coordinated to get Scully back to “battle mode.”
Scully does intense upper body and cardiovascular workouts three times a week with Billups at the new, pristine Simpson Center for Student-Athlete High Performance.
With a boot on his foot and a smile on his face, Scully maximizes impact in a short period of time, getting limited rest between intervals to recover. He feeds off that constant pressure to get over the strain of an exercise and move on to the next one, a physical sign of his mental toughness.
“What’s done is done, and all I can do is worry about getting better every day and taking advantage of every day,” he says.
Scully’s upbeat attitude through a down time in his athletic career is a testament to his resilience, a trait he attributes to his mother. But like her, he took it a step further: Scully turned his setback into an opportunity to give back to his Cal rugby family.
In addition to training, Scully spends his days in the Doc Hudson Fieldhouse with Billups and Cal coach Jack Clark.
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“He has some insights into the game that are very unique player insights,” Clark says. “It’s what the player is feeling, what the player sees happening to them on the field. That’s pretty invaluable to us as coaches to have Blaine’s input, to be able to bounce ideas off of him and then hear his ideas.“He’s just such a positive presence.”
After the jump CalBears.com gives virtual tours of Memorial Stadium and scores of Cal athletes earn All-Academic honors for the spring semester.
Football
- CalBears.com has a virtual tour of what the stadium will look like this fall. You can click on different sections to see the view from there. Kudos to whoever decided to add that Cal leads USC 14-10 on the scoreboard.
- Uncle Ted looks at who in the Pac-12 will be a 1,000-yard rusher this season. Although he will share carries with C.J. Anderson, Isi Sofele is almost certain to exceed 1,000 yards again.
- Seamus Kelly was selected to the U.S. National Team's traveling squad. Six other Cal alumni are on the traveling team.