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Get to know University of Maine hurdler Joel Evans beyond his lip ring and bleach-blond hair and you’ll find characteristics that resemble someone from small-town Maine.
He drives a Ford Ranger pick-up, and when the truck, or one of the other two cars he owns, needs work, Evans is the chief mechanic.
OK, so his other vehicles are a ’73 Volkswagen Karmann Ghia and a Porsche 914. Maybe I should have said wealthy, small-town, coastal Maine.
Anyway, let’s get back to Evans’ love for manly machines. He’s done some off-road racing.
That’s right, pickin’ up dirt and pushin’ down trees on Mother Nature’s road course.
All right, maybe there was no dirt and maybe Evans had to dodge more cactuses than trees, but he did it in one mean truck. Even more badass than his Ranger.
OK, so it was a VW Bug. A Baja Bug mind you.
Truth is, the more you learn about Joel Evans, it becomes clear he’s not from Maine or even close to it. Three thousand one hundred ninety-six miles isn’t close at all. Evans’ home in Fullerton, Calif., population 126,003, is a long way from his Brewer apartment. He’s reminded of the distance every day.
“At the first [outdoor] meet this year the wind was 15 to 20 mph,” Evans said. “I couldn’t feel my toes when I was in the [starting] blocks getting ready.”
Like other UMaine athletes from warm-weather states, Evans said the climate is one of many things he finds different about living in Maine.
He also said the people here are different. Evans calls Mainers “a lot more relaxed” than Californians. Amber Sammons, a defensive specialist and outside hitter for the Black Bear volleyball team and native of Castro Valley, Calif., is more colorful when comparing the pace of life back home to Maine.
“California is go, go, go, go, go and never stop,” Sammons said. “The only time you breathe is when you’re sleeping. There’s a lot of people, a lot of things to do. We drive fast at home. They drive slow out here. I mean seriously slow out here.”
Another difference Sammons noticed immediately about Maine people is they aren’t very different racially. She transferred from Chabot Junior College in Hayward, Calif., 20 minutes from San Francisco, where Caucasians made up 30 percent of the 17,000-student population and 367 dialects were spoken.
“My sister and I got off the plane [in Bangor] and we’re like, oh my gosh there’s a black person over there,” Sammons said. “My track team at home is all black with one white guy on it. The track team out here is all white with one black guy on it.”
Sammons isn’t bothered by the change. She’s an open-minded person, and when she decided she wanted to move to a different school, any place was fair game. During the summer of 2001, Sammons sat down with two thick manila envelopes containing all the recruiting letters that had ever been sent to the office of her junior college coach. She made a list of about 20 schools that had volleyball and track teams and offered a major in kinesiology or health and fitness.
Then, Sammons contacted her top choices. On June 4, 2001, she sent an e-mail to UMaine volleyball head coach Sue Medley. On the morning of June 6, Sammons was still sleeping when her phone rang.
“I was very intrigued,” Medley said of her reaction to hearing from Sammons. “Anybody who comes from California, especially that pocket where Sammons is from right in the Bay area, those kids have just played so much more volleyball. I called her thinking she had a lot of good skills and that she had some great experience.”
Medley had an open spot on her roster, a scholarship and a young, improving team. The opportunity was too great for Sammons to pass up. Without visiting Orono she decided to transfer to UMaine.
“That was a huge leap of faith,” Sammons said.
Evans’ arrival in Orono was even more impromptu. After spending time at two colleges near home, fixing up his sister’s wrecked ’67 Beetle and playing with it and other Volkswagen’s in the Southern California desert, Evans heard from a Bakersfield friend who, at the time, was on the UMaine women’s ice hockey team.
Her message was simple. Come on out. You might like it.
In September of 2000, Evans packed up his Karmann Ghia, made sure he had his toolbox and headed for Maine – the state with four seasons.
“Back home the weather is nice all the time, but you don’t get much variation,” Evans said. “I like the seasons.”
But not equally.
Evans’ air-cooled, rear-engine VW didn’t handle its first Maine winter as well as it dealt with off-shore breezes at Huntington Beach.
“I had to use the ice scraper on the inside and outside [of the car],” he said. “It was always cold.”
Competing in an outdoor sport has made Evans appreciate the comfortable year-round average temperature of 62.2 degrees he left in Fullerton.
“It’s frustrating to have to think about whether or not you can train outside because of the weather,” the sophomore said.
No matter what end of the thermometer the mercury is hovering at, Evans is more than likely dressed to hit the hurdles at a moment’s notice. He wears shorts and flip-flops throughout the year because that’s what he’s comfortable in. Evans doesn’t have brands like Carhartt, L. L. Bean and Red Wing Boots in his wardrobe.
Neither does Sammons. She’s a flip-flop fan too. Rain, wind and snow are no match for her bare feet. Her reasoning is simple.
“Your feet dry faster when they get wet in the snow and you’re not wearing socks,” Sammons said.
The 5-foot-8-inch junior got her feet wet in Division I volleyball for the first time this past fall. Sammons played in 27 matches and 93 games, finishing second on the team in service aces per game with 0.37 and third in total aces with 34. She recorded 131 digs during the season and averaged 1.41 per game. Medley was pleased to see Sammons become one of the squad’s best servers. The second-year coach has also been impressed with Sammon’s work ethic and dedication to improve her game.
“She’s playing at a level even a little bit higher than I expected that she could be at [Division I],” Medley said. “I think she’s going to really compete for playing time, not only at the defensive specialist position, but at our outside hitter position next fall. That’s great for us.”
Evans enrolled at UMaine and joined the outdoor track and field team last spring after working at a construction and demolition engineering firm in Bangor during the fall semester. He became the top hurdler on the team, winning the 400-meter event at two regular-season meets. At the 2001 America East Championships, Evans placed third in the 400 and clocked the second-fastest time in school history.
He now holds the school record. On April 13, during a home dual meet with the University of New Hampshire, Evans ran to a winning time of 54.66, eclipsing the standard of 54.80 set by Kirk Carter in 1992. At the conference meet last weekend, Evans finished fourth in his specialty. His goals for next year are to qualify for the IC4A meet and the NCAA Championships.
Sammons will be the only senior on the volleyball roster next fall. The graduation of All-American Leah Voss and blocks leader Adrienne Poplawski will make returning to the America East Championship match a difficult task for the Black Bears, but Sammons is confident that the team has the talent and the chemistry to compete again for UMaine’s first conference title.
“The possibilities are huge,” she said. “It’s just a matter of doing it.”
Sammons plans to move back to California after she graduates. She knows her home state will offer a lot more job opportunities in her career field than any state in the northeast. Plus, she can only stand Maine’s coldest months for so long.
“The weather kills me,” Sammons said. “I like the sun, the heat. I like to lay out.”
Evans doesn’t express the same eagerness to head back to the West Coast. He has a garage at his apartment where he can work on his cars and store the cold-sensitive rides. For the first time in two years, he’s found the motivation to stay in school and he’s met people he enjoys socializing with.
“I’ve kind of found my niche and made some friends,” Evans said. “I like it here. This is what I want.”
Bangor Daily News