Andrew Tisdale used to sit in the Santa Ana Bowl stands and wonder why he wasn’t one of the young men in red and white helmets on the field in front of him.
Tisdale, a former Mater Dei basketball player, originally came to the school for its renowned football program, but never took a leap at joining the team.
“I would go to every football game and just sit there just wishing I had done it,” he said. “And later on in my basketball career, I realized that maybe I made the wrong decision.”
Tisdale played on three state championship basketball teams at Mater Dei, which left a void in his post-graduation life. After high school, he took on a full-time job in hopes of earning enough money to attend a basketball prep school.
“I wasn’t actually able to make enough money to pay for it at first,” he said. “So I continued working and almost gave up on the whole college thing.”
With no school left to play for, Tisdale often found himself at 24 Hour Fitness until midnight, getting a release from his new, sports-free life via six-hour basketball sessions.
But it was difficult adjusting from state champion to 9-to-5 employee in such a short amount of time.
“That winning – you get addicted to it,” Tisdale said. “You always want to be on the field or competing. And sitting behind a desk, it’s kind of hard to do that, so I had to get into something.”
After nearly a year without organized athletics, Tisdale decided that “something” was the sport he had never taken a chance on. Under the advice of a friend, he contacted Santa Ana College football coach Geoff Jones.
Immediately, Jones was impressed by Tisdale’s 6-foot-6, power forward frame.
“He’s already got the tangible measures that are Division I,” Jones said. “If you go out to USC, that’s what the tight ends look like.”
While NCAA Division I football might seem like lottery odds for somebody whose only prior experience is eighth-grade flag football, Jones has confidence that Tisdale can be the next Woody Quinn: a St. Margaret’s High volleyball star who is now a tight end at Tennessee after just one season with the Dons.
Motivated by Quinn’s precedent, Tisdale is bulking up and making progress on adapting from hardwood to turf.
“In basketball when you get an ankle (injury) or a knee, it’s harder to play through,” Jones said. “(Basketball players) are so athletic, and anything that’s a ding you got to really temper. In football, everything is a ding. You’re never really feeling 100 percent.”
But Tisdale embraces the contact. In fact, he fouled out of so many basketball games at Mater Dei that referees would constantly joke that he was playing the wrong sport. Now he agrees.
“Our whole game inside the trenches down there is one giant foul,” Jones said. “So as long as we can keep him from getting his hands outside the shoulder pads … he’s going to really enjoy it.”
While the Dons don’t start full-contact practice until August, that hasn’t stopped Tisdale from leaving an early impression on his team’s defense.
“Those safeties and outside linebackers are doing more of the bouncing off than getting the best of Andrew,” said SAC tight ends coach Jeoff Meek.
Tisdale says his first year without basketball has been rough at times, but returning to an athlete’s life has him in high spirits and back on the path toward a college degree.
“All of my friends were away at college and here I was, just at home working,” Tisdale said. “So (football) was really a blessing to me – a second chance to come and play, be part of a team again.”
When he does get to play this fall, it will be at the Dons’ home stadium – the Santa Ana Bowl. And for Tisdale, the bleachers a couple yards away will have never seemed farther.
Contact the writer: joeyramirez@ocregister.com
