Rose Discusses His Future with the Media

BYU Men’s Basketball Coach Dave Rose

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It’s been a pretty interesting couple of weeks for me. But first of all I just want to thank all the medical staff, doctors and nurses at Spring Valley Hospital in Las Vegas for their care and treatment for me. Thank you also to the people at Huntsman Cancer Institute in Salt Lake City. I believe that I have received the best possible medical care that a person could receive. I’d like to thank Dr. Samuelson for all of his care and his work. I am fortunate that the bloodlines are close as he is President Samuelson’s son and the administration here at BYU has been terrific. The athletic administration and Tom Holmoe have been wonderful through the whole process. But trying to thank people would take the whole time because the support has been terrific. The current players have been terrific and former players have reached out, other coaches that I have coached with, high school players that I have coached, coaches that coached me have all wished me well and I would just say thank you to everyone for your kind words, your well wishes, your prayers. I believe that I am a lucky guy. I believe I am facing a challenge but it is a challenge that I can handle and I can continue to do what I love to do. I’m grateful to my family, especially my wife, Cheryl, for being with me all the way through it. This has been as difficult as anything I have ever been through but I feel like I got a second chance and this is my time and I’m ready to go.

I will tell you all a little bit about what happened. My family was at Disneyland in southern California having a great time and I began to feel a little bit light-headed on the last day but I didn’t think anything was wrong. I got on a plane to Vegas to go visit my wife’s family for the weekend and that is when I really began to feel light-headed. I actually couldn’t get off the plane without assistance so the paramedics took me to Spring Valley Hospital. I think you kind of know the rest from there but they tried to figure out what was causing the internal bleeding and they found a tumor. It was diagnosed as pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor cancer.

I think that when you go through everything that has turned out to be quite a blessing for me because it is a treatable and manageable cancer. My immediate treatment is to rest in order to get better from the surgery. There is no chemotherapy involved in this situation and I will have Dr. Samuelson explain that to you. But I look forward every day to the opportunity I have to come over to the office. We’ve got camps going on and I get to see my players every day. That makes me feel a whole lot better. I’m just really encouraged with the situation because of how I feel, because of what I believe and because of the people who have helped me through this. Like I said before, I believe this is going to be a challenge for me but something that I can handle.

In layman’s terms, you had a tumor and it was a cancerous, but it is gone?

It was tested positive for cancer but it has been removed. The surgeon in Las Vegas did a terrific job in his responsibility and the margins have held up. They have been tested by the pathologist at Spring Valley Hospital in Las Vegas and through the Huntsman Institute. So I believe that the surgeon was terrific and that they removed the tumor from me.

How often will you have to be scanned?

I think that in the near future it will be every four to five months and then as things get better it will be longer than that.

Once October rolls around and you begin the season, do you think you will be able to coach the way that you coach?

Well that’s what I do and that’s what I love. I think the players are wondering that too but they won’t get much of a break. But we’re really excited for the opportunity to go and do something that no one has ever done before here and that is win four-straight conference championships. We have the opportunity to do that and that’s what all my focus is right now is to put myself in a position where we have that opportunity.

Can you describe the way you feel physically and emotionally after the last two weeks?

You know I told my staff the other day in staff meeting that I actually feel better than I felt last time we met. I get tired but for two or three hours at a time I feel as good as I have felt in years. That is one of the reasons that I am so optimistic and positive about our situation. From the major surgery I had a lot of things that happened to me in order to find the problem. I have been able to recover from that and I feel great.

Did you and your wife’s involvement in the children’s cancer foundation prepare you for this experience?

Well you know what I do know is that the process that we have been through in the last couple of weeks brings a whole new meaning to how we feel about this organization and what it really does for these people.

We are able to bring these families together a couple of times a year and they can rely on each other and make friendships and understand that other people are going through the same thing. That support system is just terrific and we are more committed now to continue to help those people than we have ever been because the support that we have felt from everyone has been unbelievable, even overwhelming at times, not only from BYU fans across the country but also from fans of every school in our league. I have heard from every head coach in our league and it has been a real source of inspiration for us.

You said that you feel like a lucky guy, can you elaborate on that?

Well when you just listen to the numbers and then see what type of tumor I had. I believe it’s manageable, I believe it’s treatable. I’ve got a great University with terrific support. I’ve had great medical care. We live in a time when we can deal with this. I’ve got to be smart and do what I’m supposed to do but I believe that if I take this challenge the way it is supposed to be taken and accept it and if I listen to those who can help me then everything is going to work out just fine.

What were your initial thoughts after being informed that you had pancreatic cancer?

Well one thing that makes me consider myself pretty fortunate is that I didn’t really know. I knew some people who had gone through some tough battles with pancreatic cancer but I didn’t really know for sure what the situation was and I believed that things were going to work out. I had been through some really tough times in the hospital, a couple of really long nights, and I didn’t really let that get me down. I wanted to get to the point where I could feel better and my family was terrific. No one came in and said “Hey I’m sorry you have cancer,” it was kind of like they just let me deal with it.

As a guy who doesn’t typically seek the spotlight, has the outpouring of support from fans, players, and coaches been overwhelming?

I got a text today from one of my players at Dixie State who I probably hadn’t heard from in 10 to 12 years and he had just run into one of his teammates. And he sent me a text and these are guys who won a lot of games for me and it has been amazing. I’ve had guys that I coached in high school, coaches that I coached with in high school, and I’ve had quite a few fans that have sent me some e-mails about this particular situation as far as they have actually experienced this tumor or they know someone who has. I have a friend who said his high school coach was diagnosed with this particular tumor years ago and he’s still doing his thing so I’ve had a lot of support.

How do you feel that this experience has changed you as a person and do you think that those differences will be reflected on the sideline?

I can promise you that is something that I am really looking forward to. I love to coach, I love what I do and I think that is one of the things that has helped me get through this and helped me do this. So I will make sure that I do everything that I can to get through this. I can promise you this I will appreciate every day; I will appreciate every practice; I will appreciate every game more than I have before.

How did your players react to the news of your cancer?

Well that was something that I was really looking forward to and I got home on Tuesday evening and Wednesday we met together with the team and I just wanted to make sure that they understood that I was still their coach and that I had a real challenge ahead of me but it was a manageable challenge.

I did tell them not to feel sorry for me and I told my family that because there is such an outpouring of caring and well-wishes that I don’t want people to feel sorry for me because everything that you go through in life helps you to become a better person and this experience will help me become a better person, it will stretch me, it will make me appreciate things more and I think that this challenge is something that I don’t want people to feel sorry, I want them to experience it with me and help me and support me and hopefully things will work out the way that I want them to.

Will your schedule remain the same for the most part, as far as your day-to-day activities?

Well that’s our plan. What I have to do is to show the doctors that I’m progressing to the point that they will allow me to do that. That’s the purpose for the control schedule we have planned. The plan for the next couple of months is to allow me to get to the point that they will allow me to go full-out and do my deal.

Dr. Scott Samuelson

I’m honored to be here and help the coach. I’m here at his request. As Coach Rose has said the pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor is a very rare tumor relatively speaking. I don’t know the exact numbers but probably 10 to 15 cases would be diagnosed in the state of Utah in a year. Whereas the more common, adenocarcinoma pancreatic tumor, would be diagnosed in every one in 10 thousand people per year. So if you look at the numbers that is a much more common tumor.

In certain cases, as is the case with the coach right now, after the initial surgery at times there is no evidence of cancer and that is the situation that we are in right now. With the scans that we see there is no evidence of cancer. Now that, as I have explained to Dave and his family, does not mean that the cancer could not come back at some point. It could, but the encouraging thing about that is if it were to come back, statistically speaking, it would probably come back a long time from now.

These cancers when they do recur, they don’t typically recur for a number of years. And then they tend to be slow growing cancers which frequently tend to be much more manageable. With this specific tumor because there is no evidence of cancer at this point there is no role for chemotherapy. I have had extensive discussions with all of my colleagues and surgeons and no one feels that Dave needs any other surgery right now. No one feels that he needs any radiation treatment. The plan at this point, as he said, will be close observation. There will be no other place for any other treatments to treat this tumor at this point.

Dr. Samuelson, when was the last time Coach Rose had a scan and how often will he be scanned in the future?

He has had a scan in the last little while when he was in the Huntsman and then the scans are normally done every three to six months for the first while.

As of right now is Coach Rose cancer-free?

The correct way of thinking would be remission or no evidence of disease. That would be the technical term. And what that means is that on scans there is no evidence that we can see of the tumor. Cancer cells can hang out in small places and microscopic areas that we don’t have the technology to find right now and that’s why there is always the risk of the recurrence and the cancer coming back. But he doesn’t have a tumor that will spread to other places.

BYU Athletic Director Tom Holmoe

Could you tell us about your feelings for your head basketball coach amidst this situation?

This definitely caught us by surprise. Team Rose, led by Cheryl and Dave, is a tough team. I learned from this that their family is so tight and it’s a big family. So you learn that there are so many people that are involved in the love, comfort and care of Dave and Cheryl. Our thoughts and energy here mostly went to how we could get Dave better. He received great medical care and support and everything is working out great.

Do you feel re-energized for the program after the way this situation has turned out?

Yeah, just a little bit. I think everybody who is involved with the program sends well wishes and everyone feels somewhat connected to Dave and his family. We are all going to be together on this. We know that he is going to play and fight and coach the way he wants to. It is kind of business as usual here with a big hurdle that we have just leapt over and we have just been running alongside him in any little way that we can.