SU Basketball and one violent summer: Katie's Story

Raised in Syracuse, NY, Katie is an avid Orange fan who always roots for her boys. She grew up in the heart of Syracuse and is no stranger to the violence that can plague the city. But, while violence may draw the city apart, it's support for "the boys" that brings them together.

Description: Syracuse is a small town that wants to be a big city. We have a huge mall, a huge university, we are a big city, but you would never know it. You feel like you're in a small town because there's so much support for the boys. Everyone in Syracuse refers to the team as "their boys."

Positive: One of the most positive memories I have of Syracuse is in 2003 when SU won the national championship. You saw the entire city come together. There was orange and blue everywhere: in the streets, in the stores. Everyone was wearing blue and orange. People had painted their cars. They took markers and wrote of their windows "Let's go boys!" I was 11. 

I remember it because it was huge: in my school we were watching the games. If the game was on and we were in class, the teacher turned it on. We were a small town from upstate New York competing against these schools. For us, it put Syracuse on a lot of people's maps. Nobody thought we were going to win that year. We were a little city in upstate New York that nobody knew about until then. 

I think it changed the way our city viewed itself. We saw that our basketball team, that we could compete on this national level, that we weren't just little Syracuse, New York. We were Syracuse New York with Syracuse University. We gained a lot of national attention. All of our games are on ESPN and now we have our own local sports network: all the games are broadcast are there. I think we just inspired a lot of support for the boys.

Negative: Summer 2008 was just crazy. There was constant violence: constant stabbings, constant shootings. No one could do anything to stop it. I was disappointed in the city to a degree. We knew the police officers were doing everything they could, but there had to be something missing. There had to be 25 to 30 deaths that summer. It was really scary. 

There was a stabbing that happened four blocks away from my house. They were longer blocks, so it was little bit farther away, but it was still in walking distance. My parents were very scared. They pulled us in as soon as it started getting a little bit dark out. My little brother and I weren't allowed outside at night unless we were in our fenced in backyard with parental supervision. It was scary because there wasn't anything the police officers really could. They kept trying, kept arresting people, but there were still crimes. Not even the same people were doing it. It was just a huge crime wave that summer. I think we realized that as a city, you're going to have violent crimes, but they definitely cracked down. They put more officers out at night. Trouble areas were guarded more. In 2009, there were only eight deaths. 

I hear about violent crimes in Syracuse and I think about that summer, how scary that summer was. I'm definitely a little bit guarded at night. I have to drive by one of the most common spots for stabbings and shootings when I come from work. So if I come home at night, I take a longer way home to avoid it. I'm just too afraid to go past that place at night by myself.

Bottom Line: I love the city with all my heart, but that's not where I want to live the rest of my life. It's a great city to go home to, but it's just not the place I want to live in.