Sandy Bakshi's road through college football was a difficult and winding one. Although Sandy stood out on his high school team he was not heavily recruited by college programs, but was determined to play at the Division I level and walked onto the Syracuse team anyway. Bakshi's experience with the team was one of constantly proving himself. He was near the top of the team academically but struggled to stand out in practices, despite his athleticism and physicality he simply didn't have refined technique or seem to "fit in" at any one position. Syracuse's Head Coach during his freshman season wanted to try him out at Tight End, but it was a miserable failure and Bakshi spent most of the year on Special Teams with occasional rotation on the D-Line. This only made Sandy even more determined the next year, and he practiced extensively to improve his pass rush moves and tackling form. After all his work to polish his D-Line play, when he came back the new Head Coach wanted him to move to Linebacker, and while he played pretty well he showed some real flaws at his new position. This only further motivated Sandy, and by his Junior year he was clearly the best player on an otherwise unimpressive Syracuse defense.
"By the time I left college," Sandy told a reporter from the Tijuana Times after being drafted by the Luchadores, "I feel like I had learned how to play every position on defense. Honestly, I feel like if I dropped a little weight I could play Cornerback right now."
His former teammate LB Jerome Baxter, now with the BC Lions of the CFL, also commended Sandy as a player, "There are certain guys you look at and just know in 20 or 30 years they're going to be a head coach somewhere. That's Sandy. He couldn't always do it but he could sure tell you how to do it, that kid had the whole game going on in his head before he stepped on the field."
Outside of football, Sandy's time in college is a bit of a mystery. Sandy's teammates thought of him as a very serious person, and he graduated near the top of his class in International Relations. Several of his professors told him to pursue post-graduate education but Sandy was fully committed to football as a career. Sandy went to parties with his teammates but his friends say that he was still very calm and mild even when drinking. He met his wife in his sophomore year and remained with her throughout college, later marrying her before moving to Yellowknife to begin his major league career.
"By the time I left college," Sandy told a reporter from the Tijuana Times after being drafted by the Luchadores, "I feel like I had learned how to play every position on defense. Honestly, I feel like if I dropped a little weight I could play Cornerback right now."
His former teammate LB Jerome Baxter, now with the BC Lions of the CFL, also commended Sandy as a player, "There are certain guys you look at and just know in 20 or 30 years they're going to be a head coach somewhere. That's Sandy. He couldn't always do it but he could sure tell you how to do it, that kid had the whole game going on in his head before he stepped on the field."
Outside of football, Sandy's time in college is a bit of a mystery. Sandy's teammates thought of him as a very serious person, and he graduated near the top of his class in International Relations. Several of his professors told him to pursue post-graduate education but Sandy was fully committed to football as a career. Sandy went to parties with his teammates but his friends say that he was still very calm and mild even when drinking. He met his wife in his sophomore year and remained with her throughout college, later marrying her before moving to Yellowknife to begin his major league career.
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