Glen McGowan, Pepperdine forward and California native, explains how he’s become the Waves’ biggest attraction.
By Kyle Jorrey
Sports Editor
With around eight minutes remaining in last year’s Pepperdine men’s basketball home game against the rival Gonzaga Bulldogs, the ball landed in the hands of Waves’ forward Glen McGowan, who had positioned himself at the top of the key.
Standing between him and the basket was first team All-American point guard Dan Dickau.
“He looked at me like ‘what’s this big guy doing with the ball?’ ” McGowan remembers.
But in one swift movement, McGowan, who stands 6’9” and weighs 235 pounds, made a move right. Dickau, apparently underestimating the forward’s ball handling skills, lunged forward to make the steal. Before he got there, McGowan crossed the ball over between his legs and left Dickau dead in his tracks.
“When I saw he bit on the crossover, I just pulled up for three,” McGowan said. “And it was all net.”
The ensuing pandemonium that overwhelmed Firestone Fieldhouse made it clear that, even with time left on the clock, the game belonged to the Waves. They went on to win 88-79.
With all the attention and popularity McGowan has gained in his three years playing basketball for the Waves, the 21-year-old junior hasn’t forgotten the path that got him there. His life has been marked by a constant pattern of highs and lows, but through it all, he has kept his family close, his beliefs held strong and maintained a wide smile on his face.
McGowan grew up in southeast San Diego. After his parents split up when he was 8, his mother, unhappy with the things her son was getting into, sent him to live with his father in South Central Los Angeles.
“It was really just moving from ghetto to ghetto,” McGowan said. “It was tough, but I always just tried to keep my eyes on the prize, which was basketball.”
Surrounded by gang violence, drug-dealing and other dangerous aspects of inner-city life, McGowan had plenty of chances to find himself in trouble, but he didn’t, thanks to relentless pressure from his father.
“My father has always been one of my biggest critics, he was real tough and stayed on top of me,” McGowan said. “He made sure I wasn’t in gangs.”
After watching his older brother Bryan play basketball, McGowan decided to take up the sport himself. Each day he made the short walk to St. Andrews Park. There, surrounded by some of the city’s hardest characters, McGowan refined his game. In just a short time, those who frequented the park took notice of his unusual talent.
“I had a lot of gangsters that used to encourage me, tell me that they saw something special in me,” he said. “They knew I was going to take it to another level.”
Eventually, McGowan decided to take up organized ball as a sophomore at Venice High School. His play soon got him attention from some of the nation’s biggest schools. But the attention halted his senior year, when recruiters saw McGowan’s less-than-impressive transcripts and learned he hadn’t taken his SATs.
“I didn’t really know a lot about being recruited, so I didn’t get a lot of the stuff done I needed to,” McGowan said. “But I knew I didn’t want to go a (junior college).”
That’s when he heard from friends about a prep school on the East Coast where he could finish the classes he needed to get his degree and take his SATs. Not long after, McGowan was jetting off to Notre Dame Prep School in Fitchburg, Mass., a far cry from the rough city streets he had grown accustomed to his entire life.
But it was there, thousands of miles from his family and friends, in a place McGowan said “wasn’t too far from a prison,” that he learned a lot about basketball and a lot about life.
“I had always been an outgoing person, but that really brought it out — being on my own, not having my mom and dad there,” McGowan said. “Basically, prep school really modeled me into a man.”
The experience also gave him the opportunity to play with and compete against some of the nation’s top young basketball talent, guys like Caron Butler, who last year was drafted 10th in the NBA draft by the Miami Heat.
More than three years after leaving the East Coast, McGowan still keeps in close touch with many of the friends he made out there.
“We see each other on ESPN, and we’ll be like ‘man, I see you putting in work.’ Every time we see each other on TV we tell each other,” McGowan said. “It’s real love, real love.”
Despite the bonds he made while in Massachusetts, he knew he wanted to return home to California to be nearby if any of his family, which includes seven brothers and sisters, had any problems. Though many West Coast schools had all but forgotten his talents, Pepperdine didn’t.
After months of communication, McGowan decided on the Pepperdine, mostly because of its nature as a Christian school and because the positive direction he saw the program was heading in.
It wasn’t long after arriving in Malibu, that Pepperdine students began to take notice of McGowan, and for more reasons than just his basketball player stature. Unlike some of the athletes they were used to, he was quick to smile and offer a hello to anyone he met, regardless of their background.
“My parents were strong Christians, and they always taught me to treat others how I wanted to be treated,” McGowan said. “I just try to say hello to everybody, and the majority of people say hello back. It’s great meeting people with different backgrounds, that’s the beauty of college.”
His positive attitude and kind demeanor left McGowan a fan favorite of sorts, someone who, despite his athletic talents, could be approached like anybody else.
“I’m a person, just like everybody else. Whether I play ball or not, I know anything could happen,” he said. “(Basketball) is my life, but it’s still a game. I like to think that if tomorrow I ended up in a wheelchair I would still get a lot of love, and I think I would.”
After a year of limited playing time, McGowan returned for his sophomore year with a new coach, Paul Westphal, and high expectations. He soon emerged as one of team’s best offensive weapons, and he was anxious to take the floor for the start of the season.
It was then that McGowan almost let it all go.
A late night scuffle with a teammate in the library cost him a semester suspension from Pepperdine and from basketball. While Pepperdine was taking the floor for its first game, McGowan was back at home living with his mom, keeping in shape by working out at nearby San Diego State University.
“It was the worst,” McGowan said. “The incident itself is really nothing compared to what I went through sitting out for three-and-a-half months. It was the lowest point of my life, and I’ve had some low points.”
When Pepperdine would lose, he would blame himself, when they would win, as they did against USC and UCLA, he would cheer them on but wish he could be there.
“Growing up it’s everyone’s dream to play for UCLA,” he said. “It broke my heart not to be out there when we won. It was one of the hardest things for me to do.”
But McGowan, who was use to facing adversity, turned to faith in God and never gave up hope. By the start of the second half of the season he was back on the team. And while his game remained on point, it was the relationship with his teammates that needed fixing.
“I felt guys on the team had some resentments for me, and I felt emptiness,” McGowan said. “It was like I was a stranger.”
But with help of coaches, and the nation’s best winning streak, McGowan soon found himself back where he started. The team ripped off 14 consecutive wins and gained national attention.
As his minutes on the floor increased, students took notice of McGowan’s fan-friendly play. His athletic dunks, loud celebrations and desire to get the crowd into the game did not go unnoticed. Before long, fans found themselves expecting at least one crowd-pleaser from the forward each game.
McGowan said his exciting style of play has a lot to do with his street ball background, and with his love for a certain blockbuster movie.
“One of my favorite movies is ‘Gladiator,’ and I relate that whole movie to basketball,” he said. “When he was in that arena he was putting on a show, and when people come to a game they want to see that show. They want to see dunks, alley-oops, block shots, long three pointers.
“That’s why I’m not afraid to slap the backboard, hang on the rim, get a technical — but only every once in a while,” he continued. “I try to do stuff for the crowd, and there’s nothing like doing a dunk or hitting a three and having everyone go crazy. That’s the best thing.”
This year’s group of Waves will continue its high-flying show, McGowan said, and he hopes to get the crowd even more involved.
“I want them to know when they come here that they are the sixth man,” he said.
With his third season of basketball approaching, and the Waves roster filled with talent, McGowan and the rest of his teammates are hoping to make this run one of the best in Pepperdine history. But with all the success he’s found in Malibu, McGowan has never forgotten his roots, or how lucky he is to be here.
“Even though it’s dangerous, I still go back to St. Andrews Park to this day and people still know me,” McGowan said. “It’s tough, I’m always hearing somebody got shot, or somebody died, every time it’s something new.”
While there, he still hears the praises of old acquaintances, many of them still involved in the gang lifestyle. And though it makes made sad, he said, to know those are people stuck in a game they can’t escape, he does his best to lead by example.
“I don’t go down there to tell them to stop dealing drugs, or stop doing this, I just tell them that I’m blessed and that God has provided for me. I let them know I still love them, and they keep pushing me to succeed.”
And while at first he received a hard time about his move out of the city, now even his friends from the street have come to support Pepperdine.
“I got people in the hood rocking Pepperdine shirts with flowers on them,” McGowan laughed.
Throughout his roller coaster life, McGowan said he has escaped some of life’s harshest realities, with help of his loving mother and father (he still wears a medallion around his neck with their marriage picture) and his faith in God. This hard upbringing taught him that tomorrow isn’t promised to anyone, and he said he still laughs to think about where he is today.
“Some days after practice I just go sit outside on the bench and look at the water, and catch myself thinking about where I’m at and where I’ve come from,” McGowan said. “When people ask me how I’m doing today, I just say I’m happy to be here.”
October 03, 2002