Creighton’s Angie Benson (WBR/Spomer) CLICK HERE TO BUY PHOTO
She hasn’t scored a game-winning goal. She’s never made a big-time save or won any awards. And she’ll only show up in the box score on rare occasions due to her position on the field as an outside back in Creighton’s defense. She’s suffered through injuries and a severe illness that for a long time was a mystery to her doctors, one that left her to wonder at times if she would survive. But through it all there was one thing that Creighton junior Angela Benson always made sure to do: smile.
Growing up in rural Gillette, Wyoming, Benson didn’t get much attention for her soccer skills coming out of Campbell County High School.
“Wyoming is pretty much described as a soccer desert,” Benson said. “There are enough people to make teams and stuff like that, but we didn’t have huge clubs like there are in Nebraska and Colorado.”
To improve her game she would practice under a street light at home every single night. Then on the weekends she would play with her club team out of Laramie, Wyo., as well as using her guest player’s card to join other teams and play in tournaments. All while working out and practicing on her own.
The hard work and dedication paid off with an opportunity to play collegiate soccer. Her freshman year of college she attended the University of California, Riverside, but due to state budget cuts that delayed the development of the school’s nursing program she decided to transfer and find a place that would suit her career goals as well as her desire to compete at a high level on the soccer field.
Determined to play soccer for a quality D-1 program at a school that also had an established nursing program, she made a list of ten schools that she thought would be good fits. Thanks to some advice from her oldest sister, Brandi, who lives in Lincoln, she found her way to Creighton after about a three-month decision-making process.
“It was like everything was meant to be,” she said regarding her decision to become a Bluejay. “I can’t remember what happened to the midfielder the year that I was supposed to come in. I think she got hurt or something happened, and they actually needed someone that played my position. So when I talked to [head coach Bruce Erickson] he wanted me to come, so that kind of sealed the deal.”
Although she was eager to begin a new phase in her life, Angie (as she prefers to be called), was fighting a losing battle with an illness that doctors couldn’t quite figure out. She first experienced the symptoms in high school, and was initially treated for what her doctors believed was a parasite. The symptoms persisted during her freshman year at UC Riverside, and Angie decided to just tough it out and not bother with telling anyone.
“I would call my mom, dad, and sisters and talk to them. They’d ask me how I was doing, and I’d say ‘oh, I’m doing great. Everything is awesome’,” she said. “It was just because I didn’t want them to worry.”
Then one evening the illness just became too much for her to handle without help. She called her mom at around 2 a.m. after experiencing what she describes as really bad heart palpitations along with her other symptoms. Luckily a teammate was able to come get her to take her to the emergency room. However, things only got worse on the ride to the hospital.
“I just remember looking over at her and saying ‘Shelly, something’s really wrong’ and then I collapsed in the seat,” she recalled. “When I got to the hospital I was really weak and completely (pale).”
After being treated, diagnosed, re-diagnosed, and treated again with various medicines and procedures, Benson’s doctors were still unable to figure out exactly how to cure her from being so sick. Before leaving for Creighton, one of the doctors she was being treated by in California put her on a low dose of medicine that was designed to treat ulcerative colitis, but because of the low dosage the remedy was mostly ineffective. After four or five months went by her symptoms weren’t getting any better.
“It got so bad that I would just lay in my bed just sick as a dog,” she said. “I couldn’t go to class, I couldn’t get out of bed, I couldn’t even walk sometimes. It was a struggle just to get up and go to the bathroom and stuff like that, because it took so much energy.”
It was at this point that she began to fear the worst.
“There were points where I would lay in bed and I literally thought I was going to die,” she said. “I would tell my roommate before she would leave to come over to my side of the room when she got back and stick her hand under my nose, or on my belly, or on my heart and make sure that I’m still breathing. Bless her heart she would come in, wake me up, and kind of shake me and stuff like that.”
Now she was battling the illness while at Creighton, but she didn’t tell her new coaches right away, because as she says, she was confident that she could overcome it on her own. Even after what she had already gone through, mentally as well as physically. She had lost 15 pounds, and according to her had still not been fully diagnosed. She drank Pedialyte to help with the dehydration, and she would lay on the turf at Morrison Stadium after practice because it made her stomach feel better.
“It was so warm and so I kind of used it as a heating pad,” she said.
She set up an appointment with a gastroenterologist in Omaha, where she again was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. This time, however, she was given a better treatment plan. Six pills per day and a proper diet got her through last season, even though it was still a struggle at times. Though she played in 18 of Creighton’s 19 matches, her minutes were limited due to her weakened condition. This year, it’s a totally different story. She’s now down to taking four pills per day, eating right, and after a move to left back she is currently fourth on the team in minutes played, and is one of five players to start all eight games so far for the 6-2-0 Bluejays.
Benson, now a 20-year-old junior, has been through the gauntlet on the field. She’s suffered a concussion, a torn ACL in her right knee, and she continues to battle the ulcerative colitis that could’ve led to life-threatening complications had she not finally received the proper treatment for the disease. Despite all of this, she still considers herself lucky to have the opportunities to play soccer at Creighton and to contribute to those less fortunate off the field. It’s here where Angela Benson is deserving of the praise that she’ll tell you she doesn’t want.
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Thanks to a now famous recent touchdown run in a local spring football game, most of the country, if not the world, knows about the foundation called Team Jack. The foundation is named after seven-year-old Jack Hoffman, who has suffered from brain cancer since he was five. Jack touched the entire sports world when he ran for a 69-yard touchdown in the Nebraska Cornhuskers Spring Game back on April 6. The touchdown run won the award for ‘Best Sports Moment’ at the 2013 ESPY Awards. Though that moment may have served as a giant introduction for little Jack Hoffman and his cause, Angie and Jack go back a little further than that.
During the fall of 2012, Benson’s older sister, Mary, showed her a video of young Jack. It had an immediate impression on her.
“I watched the video of Jack and his story and I just started crying,” she said. “The first thing I thought was how can we make an impact.”
She got on Facebook originally just to see if she could get some of the bracelets representing the foundation and its cause, but it turned into more than that after she sent her message to the family. Andy Hoffman, Jack’s father, replied and told Benson that the family would be in Omaha that week. She got really excited because not only would she would getting the bracelets that she would eventually distribute throughout Creighton’s campus, but she would also get to meet and hangout with Jack. Something she began to do frequently from that day on.
However, sometimes she would have to make her visits to see Jack at the hospital secretly.
“[Coach Erickson] doesn’t know this, but I would actually skip my Friday class because they let you watch the lecture online. I was just like I’ve got to see Jack, I just have to,” she admitted. “There are things that are really important in life, and then there are things that you need to get done. I’m disciplined with my schoolwork, so I knew that I would get that stuff done and watch the lecture, so I just said why not. Why not just go and spend that time with Jack. I would go and hangout with Jack for four or five hours, and while I was there I would just meet all of these children who also have cancer.”
Befriending young Jack was her introduction to volunteer work at Children’s Hospital in Omaha, a place where she has met more children like Jack. One child in particular is named Sammy, who she actually met in a similar way to Jack, once again using social media. She contacted Sammy’s mother via Twitter and organized a meeting where she continued to reach out to other children.
“Just last week I actually went and saw Sammy, and I met another new little friend and her name was JC,” Benson said. “I just go hangout at the Children’s Hospital and play games and all of that kind of stuff. It’s been awesome.”
She credits two things for her selfless attitude and kind heart, the first of which is God.
Her faith in God gave her the strength to overcome her injuries and ailments, or she has calls them, blessings. She also credits Him for giving her the ability to do what she does on the soccer field, which in turn opens the door to opportunities like the one she has at Children’s Hospital. In a day and age where every athletic achievement seems to be followed by an argument about monetary value. She plays the game simply out of love.
“I’ve met some of the most incredible people just through soccer alone,” she said. “From my perspective I don’t need to be paid to play. It’s something that I absolutely love to do. I play for God, and just the happiness that that brings is something that you can’t even put a price tag on. I always tell people that I cannot explain the amount of joy and happiness that I get when I step out on the field to play for God. I write a bible verse on my left forearm just depending on what’s going on in my life. So whatever is pertaining to my life or if I think ‘wow, that’s really powerful’ I’ll write that verse on my arm and then throughout the game I’ll look down, see that verse, and just think I’m unstoppable. It just gives you a confidence to play for God. That’s all the compensation I need.”
The second thing responsible for making her the way she is, is her parents, Mark and Cheryl Benson. Together they instilled that ability to always see the positives in life and never back down no matter how difficult the challenge may be. It’s those values that she uses to not only help others, but also to get through whatever she may be struggling with at that particular time.
“My dad and my mom are awesome. They have faith that they can move mountains,” she said. “My mom will always say ‘just smile’ or if something is going wrong she’ll say ‘just keep your smile, God is proud of you and we’re proud of you.’ My parents are just incredible. I could fail at something and my dad would just ask if I gave it my best and when I say yeah, he’ll just say that he’s proud of me and that I’ll get it next time.”
No matter how many injuries she sustains. No matter how sick she gets. No matter how many times she hits the crossbar on a shot (writer’s note: if you go by her count it’s in the thousands), her perspective never changes.
“I’ve been blessed with so many things. I can’t explain how blessed I am to have overcome so many obstacles, my sickness being one of them. There are just way too many things to be happy and thankful for.”