Herschel Made the Utah Men's GoalBall Team!

We're really excited for my little brother, Herschel. He just found out he's made the Utah Men's Team for Goal Ball, a sport for the blind.
Herschel has a corneal disease called keratoconus, where his cornea grows irregular hills and valleys across the surface. When he was 12 they told my Mom they couldn't do anything to improve his vision until he was eligible for surgery when he was 18. So little Hersch went through Jr. High and High School with poor vision. He always struggled in school and we assumed it was from lack of motivation or laziness. He's extremely smart, so he'd ace the tests but fail the classes. Anyway, last summer he was 17 1/2 and my Mom took him to the Moran Eye Center in Salt Lake hoping they'd be open to begin treating him before he was actually 18. They were shocked at how bad Herschel's vision is--he's legally blind and one eye had a volcano so large, it created a depression that made his cornea so thin the opthamologist was concerned it could burst if he got hit in the eye, which could cause permanent blindness. They got him on the list for immediate cornea transplant. They were shocked to find Herschel hadn't been involved in blind school throughout his life. The doctors said he should have been in Special Ed to accommodate his visual impairments. So for his Sr year of high school, Herschel finally got the help he needed and went without for 6 years. They provided all sorts of gadgets for him to still function in mainstream public school: telescope to see the white board, special binoculars for TV, magnifier for text books, text books on CD, and these sweet reading glasses.
We were busting up laughing when he put them on. One eye is so bad there is no help, so it's just glass, but you can see from his magnified left eye how strong the prescription is just to read. Hersch actually qualifies to have a blind-seeing eye dog, but the years without help made him adjust and create coping mechanisms where his ability to deal with being almost blind make him ineligible. He's also been in blind school after public high school and from that program he discovered Goal Ball.

Goal Ball: The game of goal ball was invented in 1946 by Austrian Hanz Lorenzen. The first idea for the sport was a rehabilitation activity for blind veterans of WWII. It was first introduced to the world during the Paralympics held in Toronto in 1978. Since this time the sport of goal ball has grown throughout the world.
From it's description, goal ball seems like a combination of soccer, volleyball, and bowling to me. All the players have to wear black out goggles making everyone completely blind. They tape rope to the gym floor so the players can feel on their hands and knees to have reference points of where they are. The ball looks to me like a basketball sized ball, but it is filled with bells so the players can hear where it is.
My Mom says it's really interesting to see a game because it's the only sporting event where it is absolutely silent and you can't cheer during the game. The players can communicate a little to let each other know who has the ball, to get a reference where the other team mates are, etc. They basically have to throw the ball back, trying to get it beyond the court to score, like soccer. The game begins with someone basically bowling the ball across the court, then the rest the players are on their hands and knees the majority of the time.
Anyway, Herschel missed the high school season for his Senior year because he got into blind school too late, but they had an opening on the Men's team for the whole state of Utah. Yesterday was the tournament to decide who'd get the spot, and we're so excited Herschel made it!! He's still pretty green, only having played a few months, but one of his team mates plays on the USA Olympic Goal Ball team so Herschel's excited to hopefully learn a lot from him

RANDOM PICTURES OF GOAL BALL

Rhett and I are excited to be able to go see some games this fall when we're back home. Way to go Herschy!! It was funny last fall when we all found out just how bad Herschel's vision was and how well he'd hidden it with his coping skills, we felt like the dumb family that didn't even know their brother was blind. Anyway, blind school and knowing all the help available to visually impairment has changed his life, he's making awesome grades for the first time in his life and has hope for his future. We're all really proud of Herschel.