Mark WiedmerAt some point today prior to 4 p.m. Eastern, 10-year-old Eli Deml will make certain his Middle Tennessee State University blue-and-white ballcap – the one autographed by MTSU basketball star Reggie Upshaw Jr., the former Baylor School great – is positioned perfectly atop his long, golden locks, the bill to the back.
After that, he’ll slip his black tuxedo vest over his blue MTSU T-shirt, grab his trusty toy trumpet and navigate his way through Milwaukee’s Bradley Center, hopeful he’ll once more be allowed to join the pep band prior to the start of the Blue Raiders’ NCAA tournament round-of-64 game against Minnesota.
Only then will everything be as perfectly in place as it was this past weekend in Birmingham, Ala., when Upshaw and his teammates rolled to their second straight Conference USA tournament title and the automatic NCAA bid that goes with it. That night, young Eli played his trumpet with the band during the championship game and traded high-fives with Upshaw.
“We could have watched this game on TV,” said Eli’s father, Mark, from the family’s Murfreesboro, Tenn., home on Tuesday. “Middle isn’t paying our way to Milwaukee or anything. But after all the kindness that the university and the team have shown us, we felt we had to do this.”
Those kindnesses center on Eli, who has high-functioning autism, which in his case means whenever he finds something he enjoys – such as playing with the MTSU pep band – he becomes extremely focused on that one thing. About a year ago, while the Deml family was attending a home game, Eli became enchanted with the band and its dance moves. Over time, the band asked the Erma Siegel Elementary School student to join in.