My Story: Baseball's Ray Zuberer III

'My Story' is a new series on WKUSports.com of first-person feature articles written by WKU student-athletes. The student-athletes will be telling their own stories in their own words. Our third article in the series was written by baseball senior outfielder Ray Zuberer III, whose season came to a sudden end as the team was heading to Birmingham, Ala., for its first conference series of the year.

Before I start, I just want to reach out to all of those who are reading this and say that I hope and pray that all of you are safe during this time. It is truly a tragedy what is going on in our nation and throughout the world right now, but I know that we'll all get through this eventually. I also want to thank my family, friends, coaches, teammates, staff, and of course Hilltopper Nation, for everything you all have done for me since our season was cut short.

These past few weeks have been crazy and never would I have expected my senior season to be cut short. We were on our way to Birmingham to open up our first conference series of the year and we were all itching to start it up. As soon as we got on the bus, I remember talking to Bailey about how all the conference tournaments for basketball were being canceled and if we were still going to play. Coach Pawlowski was on the phone outside while we all waited on the bus nervously because we were expecting the worst. I remember him coming onto the bus and saying that we were still good to go and he'd let us know if anything changes. We weren't even an hour down the road and the bus got off at an exit and we pulled into a gas station. Coach got up and told us that our games against UAB were suspended and that we were turning back around.

We got back to Bowling Green and I was sitting in the living room with my roommates watching all these games and tournaments being canceled on ESPN just thinking to myself, "This doesn't look good for us." I'd say an hour or two later I looked on Twitter and saw a statement from the NCAA saying that all winter and spring sports had been canceled. My body went numb immediately. The first thing I did was go to the field and I sat in my locker thinking about how it's all over. All the hard work we put in during the fall and winter leading up to our season felt pointless. It was like I was living in a nightmare and I just needed to wake up.

Our team had the chance to do something really special this year and we weren't settling for anything less than a C-USA Championship. We were just starting to put some of the pieces of the puzzle together and were getting better every day. This was the best team that we've had in a while and we knew it too. It just didn't seem real that the season was over.

With all this being said, I am so thankful and blessed that the NCAA granted another year of eligibility to seniors who play a spring sport. It was like a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders and I could stop freaking out about if I will ever play the sport I love again. I'm so excited to get things going again and to chase a championship with the guys one last time next spring. But for now, stay safe Hilltopper Nation, we'll be back soon.

Ray Zuberer Signature

My Story Collection
My Story: Women's Basketball's Sandra Skinner (March 26)
My Story: Men's Basketball's Taveion Hollingsworth (April 1)

Players Mentioned

Ray Zuberer III

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