LOS ANGELES – Kyle Owens, a former college basketball standout at UC Riverside who played on his senior night just hours after receiving a cancer diagnosis in March, needs a bone marrow transplant.
And parts of the Southern California basketball community, along with the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) and the Owens family, are organizing a donation drive to help.
“Obviously I want to find a match for myself, but it's important that more people who look like me sign up for other people as well,” Owens told ESPN on Friday.
Cal Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks, California, will host a drive on Monday and UC Riverside will host a drive on Wednesday, seeking volunteers ages 18 to 40 to undergo oral swab testing to determine their genetic type , be added to the NMDP registry and finally be matched with a patient.
“It's difficult for African Americans to find the perfect match because the numbers are low in terms of the supply of donors available,” Keith Owens, Kyle's father, told ESPN. “It's an underrepresented part of the community.”
It's been a hellish year for Owens, 24, who just seven months ago was coming off a double-double against Hawaii and was headed to UC Riverside's final home game of the season when he was called to the athletic trainer's office for a Zoom meeting with an oncologist.
As a fifth-year forward, he had enjoyed a successful senior season with the Highlanders, averaging 8.8 points and 5.5 rebounds, starting 26 of 31 games and even beating Cal State Bakersfield with a jump hook at the buzzer. buzzer, a highlight that appeared on that “SportsCenter” of the night. But something felt wrong.
“We couldn't figure out what it was,” Tonya Owens, Kyle's mother, told ESPN. “We realized he didn't have the energy he normally had. After every game we were like, what is it? What is it? I was like, 'I'm sure you have Covid, I'm sure you have the flu.'”
Kyle avoided medical attention, wanting to be there for his teammates and overcome whatever he was facing until he finally gave in as the season neared its end.
The oncologist delivered a devastating diagnosis. Tests showed Kyle had acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), a type of cancer in which the bone marrow produces too many white blood cells. Not to mention, it was discovered that he had the flu and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV).
EVERYTHING can be terrible. The five-year relative survival rate for adult patients is 68.8%, according to the University of Kansas Cancer Center.
Owens' world was spinning and the game against Cal State Fullerton was approaching, with his parents, friends and high school coach Russell White heading to Riverside, 60 miles east of Los Angeles.
“My coach gave me the option to play or if I just wanted to start the game for senior night or I wanted to take pictures for senior night or she told me, 'You don't have to go if you don't want to,'” he said. “The kind of person I am, I decided to play as much as I could.”
Senior night is a rite of passage for a basketball player and often, for those not fortunate enough to play in a championship or play professionally, one of the most important games of their lives.
Owens, his family and the coach shared the diagnosis with UC Riverside coach Mike Magpayo and the coaching staff, but chose to keep it from his teammates, not wanting to burden them with the news so they could focus on the final at home. and the Big West. Conference tournament ahead.
“I started the game and made the first four or five shots,” Owens said. “And then I couldn't play again after only four or five minutes simply because my body quickly ran a fever due to overheating and overworking.”
Magpayo scored the first play of the game for the 6-foot-8 Owens. He was fouled and made one of two free throws. He kept shooting and finally made a jumper before he was taken out. Owens watched from the bench as his team won 84-74.
“That night I took him straight to UCLA and he was admitted,” Tonya Owens said.
“It was nice to play just a couple minutes to get my mind off of that,” Kyle said. “I don't know how I did it, and people to this day tell me, 'I don't know how you did that.' But that's who I am.”
Owens underwent a month of chemotherapy, followed by three cycles of BLINCYTO immunotherapy, and is still working on his graduate courses in business management.
“He ends up finishing his master's degree in his hospital bed at UCLA,” Tonya said. “And in between treatments, he goes and walks and gets his diploma and everything.”
Things were looking up, until at the end of September, while celebrating his younger brother's 21st birthday in Las Vegas, he suffered a setback.
“I guess the blood looked good from what the doctor said, and everything was fine,” Tonya said. “Until he started having back pain and then his toes and feet went numb, and it went up to his stomach, and by then we knew something was wrong.”
Owens had to quickly return to UCLA. Scans found a tumor in the mid-back region, near the spine.
“It was putting pressure on the spine, which caused nerve damage, where I lost feeling in my legs and stuff,” he said.
He's been in a rehabilitation center in Century City since then, undergoing radiation and steroid treatments and retraining the legs that used to launch him into the air to dunk and simply walk again.
“He is now considering a bone marrow transplant in the near future,” Keith said. “That's the best way for him to achieve long-term health through this whole ordeal. He just keeps going, cleans up everything he has, and starts again.”
Keith, nicknamed “The Condor,” was a former UCLA Bruin and played for the Los Angeles Lakers for one season, in 1991-92. He was on the team when Magic Johnson first retired after contracting HIV. Keith watched his teammate go through it and defy everyone's expectations, and now he sees his son showing similar resolve.
“He's kind of a hard worker by nature, so when he's given a task to work on, that's how he works best,” Keith said. “So their willingness has been great to fight through everything.”
White, Kyle's coach at Crespi Carmelite High School in Encino, California, now coaches at Cal Lutheran. He is spearheading the donation drive this week.
“It's just my way of offering something,” White told ESPN. “I have a team full of guys who are willing to help.”
White and Owens' parents hope the campaign catches on with other basketball teams in Los Angeles and the region.
“Any help is great,” White told ESPN. “Let's try to save this kid's life, man.”
