Barack Obama isn’t the only person in his extended family taking on a big challenge.
As the president-elect begins to assemble his White House team, his brother-in-law, Craig M. Robinson, opens his first season as the head coach of men’s basketball team at Oregon State University.
“Before this whole economy thing, I would have said that we had a bigger rebuilding job,” Robinson told The New York Times this week. “But this economy thing puts him over the top, hands down.”
Not that Robinson couldn’t help Obama’s economic team. He’s got an MBA from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. He worked in finance for several years.
Beyond that, he’s the guy who originally linked Obama to several people instrumental to the fund-raising effort for the presidential campaign.
But right now, Robinson’s focus is on basketball, the sport he played as an undergraduate at Princeton University.
At Oregon State, Robinson inherits a team that went winless in the Pacific-10 conference last season, losing 18 games.
Overall, the team won six games and lost 25, and it carries a 21-game losing streak into its opener this Friday against Howard University in Washington, D.C.
But Robinson, 46, is no stranger to overcoming adversity. With his sister, Michelle Robinson Obama, 44, he grew up in Chicago, where his father was employed in the city water plant and his mother worked as a secretary at the Spiegel’s catalog store.
“You didn’t have a lot of advantages growing up?” Katie Couric of CBS News asked Robinson in August.
“No, we didn’t,” Robinson answered. “But you know, if you knew my father, you knew that was no reason to not achieve and not try and do your best; and what my parent’s mantra was self confidence and hard work. “
Robinson’s parents also stressed education. Michelle followed her brother to Princeton and after that graduated from Harvard Law School before returning to Chicago, where she met Barack Obama.
Craig Robinson then vetted Obama on the basketball court.
“My sister wanted me to take him to play ball, because she heard my father and I say how you can tell a lot about a personality on the court. So, when she got serious, she said, ‘Take this guy and go play,’” Robinson told ESPN last year.
Robinson did just that and came away impressed.
“He (Obama) was aggressive without being a jerk, and I was able to report back to my sister that this guy is first-rate,” Robinson said.
The Craig Robinson-basketball connection helped Obama in other ways, introducing him to several wealthy and influential Chicagoans.
Through Princeton basketball, Robinson knew John W. Rogers Jr., the chairman and CEO of Ariel Capital Management LLC who became a key Obama backer.
Robinson also coached the young children of billionaire Penny S. Pritzker, who later became Obama’s chief fund-raiser. And he knew Martin Nesbitt, the wealthy chairman of the Chicago Housing Authority. Robinson first met Nesbitt through basketball.
Robinson graduated in 1983 from Princeton, where he was a two-time Ivy League Player of the Year playing for the legendary Pete Carril, Robinson played professional basketball in England for two years.
He came back to the United States to be an assistant coach at the Illinois Institute of Technology. Encouraged by Carril, he then picked up his MBA at Chicago and went into finance.
Though he was a business success, Robinson missed basketball. In 1999, he became an assistant men’s basketball coach at Northwestern University under head coach Bill Carmody, who had been an assistant to Carril when Robinson played for Princeton.
In 2006, Robinson left Northwestern for the head coaching position at Brown. The team had an 11-18 record his first season. The next season, it improved to 19-10, finishing second in the Ivy League.
Robinson introduced his sister at the Democratic National Convention, and he maintained frequent contact with Barack Obama during the campaign.
“I try to talk to him when I think his battery is running down and needs a pep rally,” Robinson told ESPN. “I’m trying to coach him. That’s what I do. I try to keep him pumped up.”
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1 Comments
#1. Carneice Brown White 11.13.2008
Dear Mr. Craig M. Robinson,
I am writing you as one who is a positive living example of your life and a testament for our youth to emulate. I am Carneice Brown White, a 79 year old senior. In my lifetime I have contributed to the strength of Colorado and its community teaching for 40 years. I have also been an advocate for children and parents. There are three requests I am asking of you? My health is failing and my doctors advise that I have a life threatening surgery. This is a very difficult decision I have to make and the prognosis may be fatal because of my heart condition and the anesthetics needed to perform the operation. As a young girl in high school I enjoyed and played sports, especially basketball. Now I have a 12 year old grandson who is in Jr. High school and enjoys playing basketball. The three requests I am asking of you. First, on June 22, 2009 I will celebrate my 80th birthday and request you be a guest at my celebration. Second, I would like you to meet my 12 year old grandson and give him words of encouragement. Third, I would appreciate whatever you can do to market my book, a rap “MY SALAD. It addresses the problem that we need to push for UNITY and RESPECT for all people and all cultures and work together for a better America and world. This remains a cause that will ultimately touch the lives of everyone. We all have different talents, but when tossed and mixed together we enhance and compliment each other becoming a rainbow delicacy releasing our best flavors with understanding and respect for all. America isn’t a melting pot…It’s a SALAD. We look good because we’re colorful…we taste good because we’re nutritious so STRIKE the melting pot, USA is not. SHOUT the SALAD BOWL, for diversity’s our goal. You may also look my name up on Goggle. I am not asking for any monies, just a bit of your time. I look forward to your favorable reply. I will tell you more. My address is 13901 E. Marina Drive Condo 102, Aurora Colorado 80014. My phone number is (720) 747 – 4930 , E-mail Carneice@hotmail.com
Thanking you sincerely,
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