Proud to Be a Pilot

Hi! My name is Joe. I don’t work at a button factory, but I do have a wife and two little kids, so I can commiserate with my button-pushing dopplenamer since it certainly feels like my hands and feet are constantly being pulled every which way. And who can’t relate to telling a boss you can do more even when you are already over capacity? But I digress.

I come from a long line of University of Portland Kuffners. My parents both earned master’s degrees from UP. Three of my four siblings are fellow alumni. (The black sheep who isn’t a Pilot is still invited to family gatherings, against our better judgement.) As are a barrage of aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews… suffice it to say, there are a lot of us. (Irish, Catholic). Purple is in our blood. There’s even a Kuffner Cove on the Franz Campus!

Some of my earliest and fondest memories were spent on The Bluff watching games with my dad. I was a men’s basketball ball boy for many years - I once got flattened by a player diving for a rebound, and felt like quite the celebrity after receiving an ovation from the Chiles Center faithful upon my Willis Reed-esque return to pick my towel up and get back to mopping sweat.

I was in the stands during the women’s basketball team’s amazing streak of success in the 90s. Men’s and women’s soccer matches were the highlight of every fall growing up. I spent many a spring day watching games at Joe Etzel Field, nee Pilot Stadium.

My fandom only increased once I became a student. I was there for our first women’s soccer national title in 2002. I got to cheer on the great Pooh Jeter, Megan Rapinoe, Julie Elliott, Joe Driscoll, Christine Sinclair, Donald Wilson, Conor Casey, Luis Robles, Kory Casto, John Moore, and so many more. Together with several friends, I founded Purple Pride (RIP) - the best darn Pilot basketball student cheering section there ever was.

But perhaps the most significant thing that led me on the path to founding Back the Bluff many years later was getting to personally know so many amazing student-athletes. I came to genuinely admire the hard work, dedication, and sacrifice it took for them to be successful in the classroom and on the fields. And I saw first-hand how hard it could be for them to make ends meet.

My friends who were athletes rarely had time for a part-time job, and they were prevented from making money from opportunities that were available to any other student. If they didn’t come from a family with money to spare, they often had literally no source of income. I distinctly remember a time when all the students who attended a particular soccer game got a coupon for a free item at a local restaurant. I ended up with an extra coupon, and offered it to a friend of mine on the women’s soccer team who had scored a goal during the game. She happily accepted it, but then gave it back to me with a sigh, saying it would be against the rules for her to use it. It felt (and was!) so punitive and unfair.

When NCAA rule changes in 2021 finally allowed student-athletes to benefit from Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) opportunities like any other college student, I was thrilled that Pilot athletes would finally have a chance to benefit from all their hard work.

I also felt a responsibility as a fan and alumnus to try and lift them up and support them. After all, they have lifted up my life since I was a little kid and given me so much to cheer for and take pride in over the years. And I am so excited for the day when my kids are old enough to start taking to Pilot games, just like my dad did with me.

And thus, I was inspired to start Back the Bluff.

I sincerely hope you will join me in supporting our great Pilot student-athletes through Back the Bluff, and I am so proud that we have been able to build an NIL collective that will simultaneously benefit our Portland community. It’s such a win-win, and it aligns perfectly with the mission of our great alma mater.

I had the privilege of working for the University of Portland marketing office from 2009-2015, and was recently reminded of a video series I helped produce that featured Pilot athletes and aired on local Portland TV during the Olympics. I was honored to help tell these stories. And I’m honored to be in a position now to start writing a new chapter for Pilot fans and supporters, and lift up all the great Pilot student-athletes of today and in the future.

I know you will be too. Contact me. Make a contribution. Let’s build this together.