The U of M Bisons football receiver AK Gassama is making strides this season.

Gassama talked about expectations and targets for the football team and student-athlete life to the Manitoban.

The Manitoban: There are a lot of expectations from you. So, then my concern would be, what is the target for this season? At the end of the season what should we be expecting or what have you guys targeted?

AK: I think for us, […] it’s funny because we start off the season and this is where the ‘win the day’ comes in because everybody’s goal is they want to win a championship, but I don’t think people understand how difficult it is to do that. You have to make sure first and foremost, you’re healthy, certain things that you can’t control. […] And I think, for us, our biggest target is to first get out of the Can West […], because then we go on to national semis and hopefully the Vanier Cup, which is our national championship.

So, that is the big goal at the end of the day is to win a championship. That’s what our sights are focused on, but you can’t look too far ahead and it’s so hard, but you need to be able to control every day, because when you look back, we have about 47 days until the Vanier Cup. We talk about that every day. Yesterday, coach Dobie said 48 days. Today’s 47 days. What are you doing on this 47th day to make sure you’re preparing to where we want to see ourselves at the end of the season.

M: I want to find out, you look at mid-term plans and then long-term plans, where do you want to find yourself?

AK: I had the opportunity to be blessed to be selected by the Blue Bombers in this past year’s draft. That was huge. I ended up getting sent back here to school for my last year. But, the plan is to go back into camp next year and go secure my spot, go and play professional football because, again, this is what I love to do. I’ve put a lot into this sport, into this craft and, I see myself continuing to play football for however long that allows me to, my body allows me to, my skill set.

So, again, that all comes back to continuing to work. But our whole motto with ‘win the day,’ you can’t look too far ahead, but I know what I do in these moments is going to prepare me and allow me to be ready for when my opportunities come. So, always having the bigger picture in the back of the mind, but not making it engulf everything. And so, I think, again, if I’m working during the season, doing extra work, doing all that stuff, it’s only going to allow me to be better for the future.

M: I’m a student like yourself. So, let’s talk about student life. And most people want to know as a student and an athlete, you attended classes, you are playing week in, week out over the weekend. […] How are you able to combine classes, training and playing actively in order to make sure you maintain your position in the team and also maintain your position in class? How do you go about that?

AK: I think first and foremost, when you come to university, you’re committing yourself to this lifestyle. When you come from high school, you have the chance in high school, there’s a little bit more leniency, maybe in the way that you carry yourself. But here, once you know, we always talk about this, once you sign that letter of intent, that letter of commitment with this program, you’ve bought into everything that this comes with. And I think the biggest words I talk about is sacrifice, process, routine and balance, because you need to be able to sacrifice and understand that, okay, what it is I’m trying to create with these years as a student-athlete, well, first and foremost, is to get an education, right, which is the most important thing. It’s student-athlete, not athlete-student.

So, being able to balance that, what I want to see myself come out of these five years is I need to get an education, and by the grace of God, I’ve been able to be blessed with the opportunity to do so by playing the sport I love. […] So balance is another word that I’ll throw out, which is super important.

M: What would be a general perspective in regards to how an athlete could maintain discipline in as much as he or she is involved in any activity?

AK: I think I’ll kind of go piggyback, you know, what I was speaking on before. One thing […] we hear about, it sounds a bit cliché, but if you feel like you need motivation to do something every day, it’s just not going to work. Because motivation is a feeling which has a lot of highs and lows, right. But discipline, which is super important, I think that discipline is one of the highest forms of self-love. And I think when you discipline yourself, you’re committing to seeing the highest version of yourself. And I think, and how to do that, is first and foremost, having a routine, right. When I talked about routine, it’s so important, but every routine is different for everybody. […] Also, with the routine, I think to stay disciplined is also allowing yourself to, again, know that there’s certain times where you need to adjust your routine, because again, there might be times where you might burn yourself out. Like if you can’t work for 18 hours straight, you know, so having times and okay, in this routine, I might need time where I just, I just maybe scroll on social media, doing things like that. But the disciplined self too is also knowing that there’s going to be days where you don’t want to do things, but you show up for yourself anyways.

And that’s why I talk about discipline being one of the highest forms of self-love because it’s about showing up for yourself day in and day out and knowing that, okay, I have this moment right now. And even though in this moment, I might not want to do this, I know that if I take advantage of this moment, then in the future, I’ll look back and be like, wow, I’m so glad that I did so. And it’s almost working backwards, having a goal set in mind, and then you work backwards from breaking it down and you break it down from a macro-level to a micro-level. And I think that’s how you instill discipline. So instead of trying to take on a whole bunch of things at once, and there’s no organization, it’s organizing yourself, having these major things you see yourself and then okay, what is the actionable, like the action, the verb to these goals that you set yourself and then you break those down.