After Another Cancer Diagnosis, Oklahoma's Reggie Grimes' Big Day Was All for His Grandma
NORMAN — Oklahoma defensive end Reggie Grimes had the game of his life on Saturday afternoon against UTEP.
Then again, he was playing for something much bigger than himself.
Grimes had 2 1/2 quarterback sacks in the Sooners’ 45-13 victory over the Miners at Memorial Stadium, but his performance belonged to someone else.
Grimes’ grandmother, Barbara Grimes, got a second cancer diagnosis back in April. The family has been resolute around her, just as Grimes showed Saturday by getting after UTEP quarterback Gavin Hardison with such focused ferocity.
“She’s fighting it,” Grimes told reporters after the game. “She knew, with her going through chemo, she wouldn’t be able to make it out to — because she’s at every game — that she wouldn’t be able to make it out to all the games. So she put her chemo and radiotherapy off to come see me play today. So it was really special and really important to have a day.”
Barbara Grimes traveled all the way from Tennessee to be here Saturday. Reggie Grimes said he played the game for her — as well as for first-time head coach Brent Venables, position coach Miguel Chavis and, of course, all his teammates.
But mostly for her.
“Absolutely,” he said. “I play for the name on the back of the jersey as well as the name on the front. Every game, but especially today. It was one of those things where it was important to, again, be who you are, be who you always were meant to be, and I think that’s special in a way.”
He said having her in the seats and knowing he’d get to spend time with her after the game “allowed me to play free knowing that I wasn’t doing it for the guys in the locker room, I wasn’t doing it for myself, but I was also doing it for her. So just to have the kind of performance I had today, despite everything, I think it was really touching, really great, and it was really a great moment.”
Her toughness and her will to fight through and to be there for her family has been on display, Grimes said. Being away from her has been tough on him, too.
“Been battling,” he said. “All that fun stuff but again, just going through everything, again.
“It’s great because I’m with my guys, with my family, but part of it also sucks because I know that my blood family, they’re back home and they’re going through things as well. It’s really a balancing act, but it’s one of those things where she’s fought it before and she won, so we’re hoping round two goes the same way.”
For the family matriarch, emotional support has been everything. She’s always been there, and now the family is there for her.
“For all intents and purposes, we call her Mama,” Grimes said. “She’s been everyone’s mother. She’s especially been that role for me. As far as just having Mama here, it was important, it was great, I loved it. At the same time, it’s bittersweet because today might be the last time she gets to see me play in person. It’s really one of those things to where, in the moment it’s amazing, but afterward, I’m going to go see her, I’ll probably cry a little bit. But that’s part of it.
“As far as things that she’s taught me growing up, I write on my wrist tape, I write on the top of my notes every single day, “Be who you are.” That’s one of the things she’s told me to do. That’s one of those things she’s expressed just the way she lives, the way my entire family lives. So, just being who you are. I think today, especially today, I think us as a team showed that, I think me as a person showed that as well.”
