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Jamie Boeheim knew exactly why her father drove from Syracuse to Rochester right before her sophomore season began. She knew exactly what question he’d come to ask her — it was the same one Rochester head coach Jim Scheible had asked Jamie days earlier when she told him she wanted to stop playing basketball.

But Jamie also knew that she’d made up her mind. Her father, Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim, came to make sure she wasn’t making a rash decision about moving on from the sport. That evening, he took Jamie to dinner to make sure she’d thought about how the decision would affect her day-to-day routine, social life and more.

“My dad just kept saying, ‘Are you sure this is what you want to do? You should give it a week. Why not try?’” Jamie said. 

Jamie knew she didn’t need to take the week to decide. She’d always played basketball, winning three state championships at Jamesville-DeWitt High School before playing at the University of Rochester (Division III). She’s part of central New York’s most famous basketball family that includes Boeheim, in his 46th season as SU head coach, and Buddy and Jimmy Boeheim, who both play for their father. 

But before the first practice of her sophomore year, Jamie realized she no longer had the same love for basketball. The game had become affiliated with excessive pressure, anxiety and stress — it wasn’t giving her the same joy it once did. Those closest to Jamie said the decision to move on from a lifelong passion to prioritize her own happiness speaks to her strength as a person. And now, over two years later, Jamie said she doesn’t regret the decision at all.

“People just automatically assume, your dad is a Hall of Fame coach, so basketball is your priority,” said Kasey Vaughan, Jamie’s close friend and a former J-D teammate. “I sensed that she didn’t want basketball to be her everything.”

By Jamie’s junior year of high school, she realized that Division I wouldn’t be attainable. Even though she knew she wasn’t good enough for that level, she wondered what recruiters and coaches were saying about her. She wondered what they thought when they read her last name. That recruiting process sparked some of Jamie’s first conscious thoughts about falling out of love with basketball, she said.

Scheible said Rochester was a perfect academic fit for Jamie, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted to be a college student at another larger school or play basketball for the Yellowjackets. In the end, Jamie picked the latter, but Scheible said that wasn’t a definitive call.

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From the start, Jamie was exactly the player Scheible hoped she’d be, averaging 11.9 minutes per game off the bench. But the stresses affiliated with basketball from high school persisted. Jamie said she was doing the bare minimum workload on the court, and the level of difficulty between high school basketball and college had increased significantly — she had to start at the bottom and earn her minutes in the new environment.

There was also anxiety associated with new people watching her play for the first time, with the difficulty of practice and with getting her regular work done. The pressure Jamie put on herself became 10 times worse, said Meg Hair, a former J-D teammate and close friend. 

“Everything kind of started falling around me, and I realized that the main reason was because of basketball,” Jamie said.

Growing up, Jamie started playing basketball at a young age just like her brothers. But she sensed that a part of the decision was also because she “was supposed to.”

In middle school, Jamie told those who asked that softball was her favorite sport. People were interested when she didn’t say basketball, Jamie said, and she liked being different than the rest of her family. 

Jamie still liked the sport, though. She made J-D’s varsity basketball team in eighth grade and was a very skilled player because of how long she’d been playing. Juli Boeheim, Buddy and numerous close friends called Jamie the most athletic member of the family. She moved quicker and easier on her feet than her brothers, former J-D coach Rob Siechen said. 

Jamie was in the gym a few times a week outside of practice, but she didn’t want to devote all her free time to training like Buddy did. Getting up shots wasn’t her top priority, Hair said, though many said she could’ve been a Division I athlete had she felt differently. She played lacrosse and swam in high school and was a “social butterfly” who loved hanging out with her friends.

“Life to her was so much more than basketball,” said Danielle Rauch, Jamie’s former AAU teammate and a close friend. “She liked playing, but I think it was more of something that she just did. It wasn’t who she was.”

Jamie played well in the spotlight at J-D, earning three All-League honors and posting 890 career points. She was a team leader and always gave her full effort at practice. Yet behind the scenes, she could feel the pressure mounting. 

On one occasion, Jamie was training on a side court in Carmelo K. Anthony Center during the SU men’s basketball team’s practice. Boeheim closed out his practices by making one person shoot two free throws while the team watched — sometimes players took the shots, sometimes coaches and sometimes even managers. So he asked Jamie to shoot. But Jamie said it was stressful because she didn’t know any of the SU players, and she missed both shots.

Katie Kolinski, an SU graduate assistant at the time, recalled the moment too. She understood that Jamie was struggling with self-confidence then. 

At Boeheim’s suggestion, Jamie worked out regularly with Kolinski, sometimes in the ‘Melo Center and other times at the Boeheim’s house. She helped Jamie with her shooting form, 3-point range, taking players off the dribble and capitalizing on her athleticism. 

Still, later in high school, Jamie said she would stress for hours before games, and then again hours after. She focused on the negatives and the shots she missed, not the ones she made, Hair said. Her last name brought omnipresent pressure because she didn’t want to disappoint anyone.

“I was putting myself through so much more than just loving basketball,” Jamie said.

At Rochester, that conflict continued throughout Jamie’s freshman year. Jamie tried not to think about basketball during the ensuing offseason, but eventually, in the month leading up to tryouts, she grew very conflicted about what to do, Vaughan said. 

Jamie passed the mid-October fitness test where she had to run a mile, but as soon as she got back to her room, she broke down crying. She was dreading practice the next day and finally acknowledged the emotions and thoughts she’d been suppressing. 

Jamie Boeheim decided to go Rochester before she decided to stop playing basketball. Courtesy of Jamie Boeheim

“It all kind of hit me at once,” Jamie said. “I think that just triggered a huge emotional realization that I wanted to quit basketball.”

Jamie met with Scheible the next morning and told him that she wanted to shift to a team-manager role. She didn’t tell her parents — who were supportive of the decision — until after the meeting.

“To me … this was about her being true to herself and doing more of what she wants to do,” Juli, Jamie’s mother, said.

The temptation to return was present, but Jamie knew it wasn’t what she wanted. Instead, she watched from the sidelines as the team manager for a year, running the shot clock at the scorers table, working with assistant coaches and more. The transition was awkward, and the first game of the season was upsetting and challenging, she said. 

But Jamie was close friends with many of her former teammates, so shifting to team manager was a logical “stepping stone” for her. Jamie explained the shift to her teammates with a phrase Scheible said he’d heard from her multiple times before: “Just because I’m a Boeheim doesn’t mean I have to love basketball.”

Jamie stepped away from the manager role after the pandemic hit. This past summer, she interned at Crouse Health’s Bill and Sandra Pomeroy Treatment Center. Friends called her compassionate and empathetic, making her a good fit for a role where she met with patients for therapy sessions at the outpatient center. She did more work with substance-misuse patients last fall, too.

As for basketball, Jamie hasn’t played in over a year. She doesn’t play pickup or shoot around anymore. It brings up difficult emotions. But she still loves the game, still supports her family and former teammates, and still has a strong connection to the sport — even if it isn’t as a player anymore.

“She said she found her happiness,” Kolinski said. “That’s kind of what it’s about, just being happy.”

Published on January 30, 2022 at 11:00 pm

Contact Roshan: [email protected] | @Roshan_f16