Will Daniel: Richmond basketball superfan

It is no surprise to anyone who knows Will Daniel that his favorite sport is basketball. Will can be seen at almost every home basketball game, dancing under the basket or sitting in the front row of section 19, supporting the Spiders.

Will has been going to basketball games since he was 3 years old, said his father. His family has been around Richmond athletics for a long time. Will's mother, Pat Daniel, attended Richmond for graduate school and his father, John Daniel, the T.C. Williams School of Law. While John was in school he was also the men's club soccer coach.

Will said that he was raised on Spider basketball.

"I love the atmosphere," Will said. "I love to go in there, look around, look at all the banners, look at the pictures they have on the wall. I just love that stadium and how they've brought it to life."

Will doesn't just watch basketball. He has been playing basketball for the Special Olympics for 10 years. At birth, he was diagnosed with Down syndrome, a genetic condition in which a person has 47 chromosomes instead of the usual 46. The extra chromosome causes problems in the way the body and the brain develop.

Will said that his Down syndrome does not inhibit his ability to participate in everyday activities. He's a point guard and his team practices once a week and plays in tournaments on the weekend. Last weekend, the Richmond women's soccer team went to support Will at his basketball tournament at Lee-Davis High School.

"I like getting out there, doing the best I can, giving it all that I got, and getting my team involved in the game," Will said. "I like the players I play with and it's fun to come out and show everyone what we do for a living. I love it so much."

Will is not only an athlete for Special Olympics. He speaks at fundraising events such as the Dulles Day Plane Pull in Washington D.C. and the Polar Plunge Winter Festival in Virginia Beach. He is considered a spokesperson for Special Olympics. Through his speeches, he hopes to remove stigmas about his community.

Will has two mentors who work with him on his speeches and give him tips before he speaks to the public.

"The only thing I have to concentrate on now is looking out into the audience," Will said.

Will competes in a variety of other sports for the Special Olympics, including soccer, track and field, softball, tennis and bowling.

Will has a couple of favorite Spider athletes from the past and the present. He said his all-time favorite Spider basketball player was Kenny Atkinson, who played for Richmond during the 1986-1990 seasons under head coach Dick Tarrant.

"That team was awesome," Will said. "The best year ever."

As for current players, Will said he likes them all. But he said some of the best are Richmond native Ryan Butler, who graduated last year, Kevin Anderson and Dan Geriot.

"Kevin Anderson is a guard and he does a great job doing it," Will said.

Will also said he liked freshman Derrick Williams.

"I like when Coach puts him in, it's like he's a big old muscle," Will said. "It gives the guys a boost."

One thing that inspires Will about the basketball games at Richmond, he said, is how the athletes run out of the big spider tunnel. Will also said he enjoyed seeing how the players responded to all of the coaches on the sidelines. Will has watched many of the coaches that have come through Richmond, including Dick Tarrant, John Beilein, Jerry Wainwright and Chris Mooney.

Will loves to watch the team warm up, especially when they practice their dunks.

"I love how the kids react to that," Will said. "I just love the sport, I really love it. It's awesome, really encouraging, it motivates me a lot for the games I play in. [The team] gives off great energy when they first come onto the court."

Director of Basketball Operations, coach Peter Thomas, said the basketball team really looked forward to seeing Will at the games. Thomas said the team had gotten to know Will, gotten to know his situation, and loved to see how positive and energetic he was.

"He just has enthusiasm for everything he does," said Thomas. "It's easy to be negative, especially when you are losing a game or things aren't going your way. But Will helps you realize that if he can be positive, than you sure as hell can be too."

Along with Richmond basketball, Will also follows a few soccer players who he holds close to his heart. In 1997, when Will was 16 years old, the NCAA Men's Division I Soccer Final Four took place in Richmond. Will and his family went to the airport to greet the UCLA men's soccer team as they came off the plane from California because Will's mother was the team's official NCAA volunteer host.

As soon as the team met Will, they became instant friends. Will rode back to the hotel on the team bus that night and in the days to follow he went to their practices. The team went on to win the National Championship that year under head coach Sigi Schmid and gained a lifelong friend in Will Daniel.

"Sigi would have Will in the locker room and in the team meetings," said Pat Daniel. "He let Will give the team speeches too."

Since Will's friendship formed with the UCLA men's soccer team, he has continued to follow the success of some of the players and coach Schmid. The Daniel family sets out on what they call "adventures" to watch the men from the 1997 championship team play on professional soccer teams.

In 2006 the Daniels traveled to Germany for the World Cup to follow Will's friend Jimmy Conrad (who played for UCLA in 1997) and they have been to Tampa, Fla., to see Josh Keller play for the Tampa Bay Mutiny. The family has also traveled to Houston and Washington D.C. to watch Kenny Atkinson coach in the NBA, and one of the next adventures on the list is to head out west to Seattle to see Sigi Schmid coach the Seattle Sounders FC.

On top of Special Olympics, Richmond Spider athletic events and traveling across the country to support his friends throughout the sporting world, Will manages to find time to work at Martin's on the corner of Three Chopt Road and Patterson Avenue. He has been working there for seven years and works six-hour shifts between four and five days a week.

"Everything about it is pretty cool," Will said with a big smile on his face. "I see lots of people when I work. Sometimes I see people, and they know me, but I don't know them. It happens a lot."

The Daniel family has a scholarship fund at Richmond in memory of their daughter Sarah P. Daniel who passed away as an infant on Dec. 6, 1985. The scholarship is set up for Freeman and Tucker High School students who are attending Richmond. When there are no incoming freshman who qualify for the scholarship, the money is given to other deserving students.

"There are not a lot of criteria [for the scholarship]," John Daniel said. "They are well-rounded kids, not necessarily superlative in academics."

Will did not have too much to say about his disability. He said that he was accepting the fact that he had Down syndrome and that he recognized he did normal activities with his family and friends.

"I was lucky, actually, that I have the disability I have now," Will said. "I can't explain all of it."

John said that Will's disability hadn't kept him from anything he wanted to do. Will still goes to the movies with his parents, his brother and his friends who he grew up with in the neighborhood. Will also recently became an uncle last March when his niece was born, and he occasionally gets to take her out to dinner. He said he was very hopeful that he would be around next month for her first birthday.

"My family, all of them, have been the best ever," Will said. "Even though I was born with Down syndrome, they absolutely love me. They know what I can do. They have been my mentors and my teachers since I have been growing up."

Will does a lot of tasks at home independently. He empties the dishwasher, cooks meals, takes out the recycling, makes coffee and sometimes helps his father with the yard work.

"He really doesn't have a lot of challenges," John said. "He'll work hard. He's got a lot of athletic ability but he has to work hard. Coordination sometimes gets in the way but he doesn't have many challenges."

Will disagreed with his dad. He said, with a laugh, that his toughest challenge was making his bed in the morning.

Will talked about how he had made an impact on members of the Richmond community and how many people at Richmond loved seeing him at the basketball games. His response: "Can you blame them? What's not to love?"

Contact reporter Bria Eulitt at bria.eulitt@richmond.edu