Randy York's N-Sider
Sean
Fisher celebrated
birthday No. 23 Thursday like he tackles almost every other day ... checking
off his “to do” list, making sure everything’s in order and taking care of the
most minute detail in his life so he can share a milestone with those
closest to him. Make no mistake though. Fisher’s total focus this week is
Arkansas State, not because he will receive a third straight George Finley
Sullivan Award, a fully endowed scholarship that will be presented 20 minutes
before Saturday’s kickoff, but because his focus is on helping his teammates
get back on a championship track.
In his fifth
year as a Husker, Fisher maintains a perfect 4.0 GPA in both business administration
and pre-medicine. He’s used Bo
Pelini's “improve every day process” mantra to guide his academic
achievement. He’s also a favorite among Nebraska’s night security guards who
have watched him be the last person to walk out of the Student-Life Complex
since his arrival at Nebraska in 2008.
Fisher smiles
when I tell him that. “It’s been a great place for me to study,” he said. “I
think I know almost every night janitor we’ve had here, too. It’s been great.
This place has definitely prepared me for life.”
A Chip Off the Old Block of His Dad,
Todd Fisher
Sean reminds George
Sullivan of his dad, Todd Fisher, a
cornerback on Nebraska’s 1983 and ’84 teams. “Todd was a great young man when
he played here, and I think Sean’s just like him in a lot of ways,” said
“Sully”, who served in Nebraska’s Athletic Department for more than 40 years, including
the last 18 as head athletic trainer until he retired in 1995.
“I’ve seen a
lot of leaders come through here,” Sullivan said. “Sean and his
dad aren’t the kind of people who jump out at you as leaders, but they’re the
kind of people who everyone wants to follow. Our scholarship goes to someone
who’s pursuing a career in the medical field, and I know this. I’m 85 years
old, and I hope I’m still around when Sean becomes a doctor because he’s so
even-tempered, I’d like to have him be my
doctor.”
Sean Fisher,
Nebraska’s 6-foot-6, 230-pound senior starting linebacker, is so humble and so
quietly efficient and accomplished, he won’t even tell a writer the score he
received on his Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) six weeks ago. “I did
well, but I don’t want to say what I got,” he said Thursday. “Let’s just say I
was happy with it.”
An MCAT Score So Good He’s Keeping
It Private
Later, walking
through the glass tunnel that connects Nebraska’s Hawks Championship indoor
facility with the North Stadium Complex, a member of Nebraska’s coaching staff
tells me Fisher’s MCAT score. Out of respect for the one who achieved it,
however, we honor Fisher’s sense of privacy. He has, after all, set his sights
on the University of Nebraska Medical
Center, but admits it would not be out of place for him to apply to the
University of Chicago, one of the top 10 medical schools in the country.
Last fall,
Fisher was named a second-team Academic All-American at a school that leads all
NCAA institutions in that category. “It’s important for a couple reasons,” he
said. “No. 1, you walk down that hall to eat at the Lewis Training Table and
you see some of the faces on that wall. To be in that same company with some of
those guys is pretty humbling. No. 2, it’s nice to be recognized in anything
you do when you work hard. Football’s great, but in the grand scheme of things,
most people aren’t going to end up playing football when they’re 30 or 40 years
old.”
Fisher says the
best lesson he’s learned as a Husker is the ability to manage his time and
develop a work ethic that he didn’t have in junior high or high school. He’s
learned how to do things that aren’t all that motivating. “It’s how the real
world’s going to be,” he said. “You can’t really take a day off, and I’ve taken
very few days off since I’ve been here. Being here has helped me increase my work capacity almost exponentially.”
Pelini’s Process Standards Apply
Academically, Too
Fisher was an
early adopter in applying Pelini’s strict process standards to academics. “If
you believe in that philosophy and do what you’re supposed to do, I think that
carries over into whatever you do in life,” he said. “You have to stay focused
on the small things and the day-to-day process. You can’t allow yourself to get
overwhelmed and bogged down by the bigger picture. If you start thinking about
everything you have to do instead of what you can only do one day at a time,
you lose ground.”
Fisher sees
himself as living proof of that philosophy. “I’ve always known I wanted to be a
doctor, but I didn’t push myself in high school,” he said. “I had something
like a 3.0, and my parents weren’t real pleased with my effort. I think I held
back knowing that I’d really start applying myself when I had to, but they
didn’t seem to think that was a good plan. They thought it would have been
wiser to develop good habits earlier and they’re probably right about that.”
Todd Fisher,
who develops and manages real estate in Omaha, and Cathy Fisher, Sean’s mom,
are diligent planners. Last weekend, Todd was in Los Angeles to watch Sean play
against UCLA, while Cathy was in Iowa City watching younger son Cole play against
Iowa State. This weekend, they reverse roles. Todd will attend Cole’s game against
Northern Iowa in Iowa City, and Cathy will be in Lincoln to support Sean. “I
wish Todd could be on the field when Sean gets his award, but his parents do a
great job of supporting both kids at the same time,” Sullivan said.
Once Classes Started, No Time to
Play Around
Parental
leadership spurred Sean to shift his academic gears early. “I knew what I
wanted to do and when I got to college, I knew there was no time to play
around,” Sean said. “I knew I had to sit down and focus and get really serious
about being a doctor. I didn’t really have a back-up plan, so the day I got
here I started applying myself a lot more in school. I figured if I established
the work ethic right away that first semester, I’d be able to keep it going all
the way through. I mean, it’s not something you can delay and catch later. If
you’re serious, you have to do it straight-away.”
Dr.
Pat Tyrance,
one of three Huskers in the CoSIDA Academic Hall of Fame, is a role model for
Fisher. “He was an Academic All-American linebacker here, played in the NFL,
went to Harvard and became a spine surgeon,” Fisher said, indicating that he’s
fairly certain he wants to become a surgeon himself.
Two summers
ago, he spent a considerable amount of time shadowing Dr. David Clare,
who works for the Nebraska Orthopaedic and Sports Medicine team that serves the
Huskers. “Everybody knows what a great player Grant
Wistrom was, too, but he was also very smart and won an NCAA Top Eight
Award,” Fisher said.
Using the UCLA Game as the 2012 Eye-Opener
As focused as
he is academically, Fisher does not want his last athletic opportunity to
fizzle. “I think we’ve responded well in practice this week after what happened
in LA,” he said. “We all talked the other day, and if we respond Saturday like
we should, we can use the UCLA game as an eye-opener. At the end of the season,
that’s how we want to view what happened. We want to use that loss to progress
accordingly.
“It’s really up
to us and how we approach the rest of the season,” Fisher said. “We can use the
UCLA game as a learning experience instead of a loss. We’ve had a good week of
preparation, and we’re ready to go again. I don’t think last Saturday’s loss
changed anybody’s views on what we can still do. We can absolutely still win
the Big Ten and accomplish what we all feel we’re capable of accomplishing. The
past is what it is, and we’re looking forward right now. We’re solely focused
on this weekend.”
