Dillon Graham: Rebound

The lights were twinkling, the stockings were hung and snow was falling gently on the television screen, because this is Florida after all. It was Christmas 2013, and while most were soaking up the happiest time of the year, Dillon Graham was feeling anything but.

“When I went home for Christmas break I was doing nothing [at University of Florida]. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life,” Graham recalls. “I was just so depressed and I was with my family. I was really struggling. It was probably the lowest of my low in my life.”

Graham, a 6’4” RS Sophomore guard for Billy Donovan was struggling thanks to hip spurs that left him in insurmountable pain and with the potential to lose everything important to him.

He played sparingly his freshman year, accumulating 81 minutes over the season and a .263 shot percentage. Heading into his sophomore year, Graham was expected to be a solid guy off the bench on the senior laden team. But after playing only 8 minutes in the season opener, Graham stepped off the hardwood not knowing if he’d ever return.

After heading home to Orlando for the Christmas break, Graham found himself sinking lower and lower into a darkness alone and one that he didn’t quite know yet how to get out of.

“I lost everything. I lost friends; I lost relationships with some of my teammates. I’d even say with some of my coaches, just from kind of giving up. I’ve never given up on anything and I gave up on basketball and my career playing.”

And thrust into adulthood with a table full of choices that only he could choose from.

“There were so many choices. Give up basketball, to give up the school here, to give up everything really. I really had to make a tough decision if I wanted to stay, if I wanted to leave, if I wanted to give up basketball. But I prayed about it.”

The answer to that prayer came in the form of a doctor’s office where Dillon got a glimpse of a future he couldn’t envision.

“Me and Duke [Warner, team physician], we all went to the doctor here and he told me I’d probably need the surgery if I wanted to play basketball later on in life and I mean right there it was an instant decision for me. I had to get it done. And that was just for basketball. And then he told me after the surgery if I ever wanted to run with my kids or if I wanted to have kids one day then I’d be thankful to have this surgery.”

The surgery was successful but the real damage came as the season went on. Spending a season as someone recovering from injury proved difficult and Dillon admittedly pulled away from his teammates and coaches. Practice after practice, game after game, they all came and went with Dillon able to do nothing more than offer platitudes of encouragement as he saw him teammates tear through a perfect SEC season on the way to an incredible Final Four run.

Head coach Billy Donovan was in the midst of that March Madness run with a whole team looking to him to guide them through the games. As Dillon watched from the back of the huddle, Donovan could do nothing more than look back and sparingly offer his support when possible but he saw from afar what was happening. Unfortunately, he explains, there’s only so much one can do to combat the separation until the guys come back.

“We talked a little bit about some of the stuff. Once you get into the season, the games are coming so quickly. For a year [Dillon and Eli Carter] were totally removed from our team outside of pregame meal or sitting in practice. After about 10 practices you’re sitting there for 150, after a while it gets old, it gets monotonous and you feel disconnected. As a player you can feel on an island by yourself a little bit.

The one thing about Eli and Dillon, they’re such good kids that I think they didn’t want to be a distraction to our team but I know deep down inside both those guys were hurting because they didn’t get to play and experience on the court what those guys got to experience there.”

Time missed for Dillon’s injury is only part of it though, and Donovan compares Graham to former Gator Eric Murphy as a guy who took a little time to find his potential.

“[Dillon] got a lot of ability. He’s a good passer; he’s a good athlete. It looks like he’s healed up pretty well.

He’s been a guy that maybe I’d agree with that, he’s kind of distanced himself a little bit and I’d like to see him make more of an impact and more of an investment into his teammates and into the team and more importantly make more of an investment and impact for himself.”

Murphy went through a tumultuous time his first couple of years in Gainesville, including arrest and sub-par play on the court. But then he “started to figure some things out and made a greater commitment” as Donovan puts it, and by the time he was drafted by the Chicago Bulls in 2013, Murphy had become just the 49^th Gator basketball player in history to record 1,000 points.

Graham hears Donovan’s words and is two steps ahead of him, already forging a new path for what he calls his second chance.

“I guess the love of the game came back after I lost it for a year,” Graham solemnly recalls.

“I lost it for a year, I mean I never thought I was going to play again to be honest so I lost the love for the game. So when I got that back I got the love for everything back.”

With it came a determination that he had been missing.

“My offseason this year was completely different than my freshman year or my sophomore year. My work ethic was just revved up 100%. Just rehabbing trying to get back on the court just trying to play freely and have fun with the game.”

But more importantly, he regained the most integral thing needed to contribute to a championship team.

“I got my teammates back. I defiantly had to earn their trust back by being in the gym, being around them just it all came back it just took a little bit.”

One guy who he’s quickly earned the trust of is freshman Zach Hodskins, who has made national headlines as a sharp shooting basketball player missing the lower portion of his left arm. Dillon saw the opportunity to make that impact Donovan is asking for and took Hodskins under his wing.

“Great kid, great guy, really good basketball player. I can’t imagine being in in his situation growing up like that. I mean he’s so blessed to be here and I wanted to look out for him a little bit. Not that he needed it. Just when I was a freshman I would say I wasn’t really looked out as much as I thought I was going to be so I told myself if a freshman came in I was going to look out for him.”

It won’t be long before Dillon will return to the O’Connell Center with Zach and the rest of his teammates, with a newfound love and hopefully sustainable time on the court.

Coming out of high school Graham was fielding offers from not only Florida but big time programs like Kansas and Louisville as well. When compared to a Yeti or Bigfoot, lots of stories but only small glimpse, Graham laughs and agrees.

“Every year it’s like I play a little bit and then I get hurt or my freshman year I was nervous and didn’t really know what I was doing so we’ll see what happens this year.”

What this year will bring, no one knows just yet, including Graham, but the excitement of that is exactly what he wants Gator Nation to feel.

“God’s got a plan for me and I’m just so blessed to be here and excited for the season. I’ve got to keep y’all guessing. Got to keep everybody guessing. I still have this year and two more years so we’ll see what happens.”