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February 22, 2008 > Sports > Bower breaks down barriers to bring you Rice sports

Bower breaks down barriers to bring you Rice sports

By Casey Michel | Thresher Editorial Staff

Close your eyes and picture a sportswriter. What image pops into your mind? There’s the fedora with the note card sticking out like a Robin Hood feather. There’s the tweed jacket that hasn’t been in fashion since 1960. And there’s the in-your-face attitude that’s more suited to a pesky younger brother than a professional.

Now open your eyes (don’t mind the weird looks people are throwing your way), find the nearest Houston Chronicle and check out the picture of the guy who writes the Rice Owls beat. No, your imagination isn’t fooling you, those are dreadlocks that are filling up the background of the picture. And no, this guy is not pulling a Samuel Clemens — MoiseKapenda Bower is this man’s real name. And covering Rice athletics is his job.

Many of you are more than familiar with Bower’s materi- al — some of you have probably even been featured in his writing. And, with the exception of the paper and ink you’re holding in your hand, there’s really nowhere else Rice fanatics can get info on their beloved Owls. But what many do not know is that Bower, whose sometimes cutting, sometimes jovial writing keeps a fleeting audience entranced for at least a couple of minutes per day, did not originally intend on being a writer. In another lifetime, Bower says, he would have rather been writing prescriptions than writing pre-game insights, although his doctoral dreams soon faded.

“Once I made the decision to not go to medical school…I had some soul-searching to do,” Bower, a native Houstonian, revealed. “There was a long gap between me finishing school and me getting to the position where I felt like I was on my way. … And there’s a part of me that looks back and says if I had gone here, finished school there and done this, I’d be a doctor someplace, and I’d probably be completely miserable.”

With pre-meds more prevalent than accusations against Pacman Jones, Rice was an obvious fit for Bower. However, after one year of being socially stilted, Bower, decided to transfer to the School of Medical Technology at Howard University in order to continue his dream of being a doctor.

But before long, Bower’s dreams, like a Roger Clemens testimony, shifted, and he soon found himself with an itch that needed scratching — Bower wanted to write about sports.

“I’ve always loved writing, and I’ve always loved sports,” Bower said. “I was the kid in middle school who would bring the sports page to school with [him] and read it on a daily basis. As I went further along, I realized I could blend the two. There was a point in time where I realized I could use my ability to write and parlay it with my love for sports, and I just had to make happen.”

However, this realization came a bit too late for Bower to find any suitable internships out of college. After returning to the Space City, Bower bounced around a couple radio stations and online publications before “hustling” his way onto the Chronicle’s staff.

Despite a complete lack of formal training, Bower now finds himself covering a school that he once left for broader horizons. But even for a sportswriter, this is no normal job.

“There were a lot of sleepless nights in Hanszen, in terms of what I wanted to try and do with myself,” Bower recalled. “I love the irony of [being back here]. I thought when I got this beat it was too perfect, because there’s always going to be a part of me that’s going to love Rice — there was a part of me that was very happy to [see Rice] win the national championship in 2003 — there’s still a little bit of a fan in me.”

As has often been said to someone who has lost a close match, there is more to life than sports, a sentiment that Bower shares. Although his writings have often focused solely on the goings-on of Rice athletics, volumes of diaries from his youth attest to Bower’s desire to write about nearly anything. So if you see a bound tome with his name on it in the near future, don’t worry if the content is about culture rather than Chase Clement.

“I want to do something from the perspective of people of my culture and my situation, and growing and developing in society at large,” Bower noted. “And I think there are some [book] ideas bouncing around in my head, but … that first book is going to be a cultural book and have nothing to do with sports at all.”

Casey Michel is a Brown College sophomore and sports editor.

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