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Southern Illinois University Edwardsville
Thursday, March 14, 2024 Vol. 77 No. 22
THE student voice since 1960
Nursing alumna overcomes challenges and sets sail by Michal Kate Castleman / online editor
Jenny Decker graduated from SIUE’s nursing program in 2006. Now, she is setting out to be the first person with Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease to solo sail around the world.
Decker said Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, or CMT, is a degenerative disease that affects the peripheral nerves of the body. “My brain is sending signals to my body and it’s not really getting a response,” Decker said. Decker said she had difficulties walking as a child and was often carried. At one point, she said she was misdiagnosed with cerebral palsy. “Shriners hospital decided to do a pro bono surgery on my legs [despite] not having a diagnosis,” Decker said. “S h r i n e r s hospital is probably the only reason
photo courtesy of Lia-Lucine Cary
why I’m an independent walking human today.” Decker has been an intensive care unit nurse for eighteen years and said there are many medical professionals who have never heard of CMT. She said CMT does not have a cure, but it has become one of her life goals to create awareness around the disease. Decker said she is collaborating with the CMT Research Foundation, a non-profit organization that is focused on delivering treatments and cures for individuals who have CMT. “How are we supposed to raise funds toward research for a cure for a disease that no one’s heard of? In this day and age, you have to do crazy things to get an audience’s attention,” Decker said. “It’s not about the attention for the trip, it’s more for someone behind me. It is also … a solo endeavor for myself to complete.” Decker named her trip “Just a Lap,” which she named after a playlist she listens to while sailing. Decker said she considers “Just a Lap” to be a mindset for herself during her journey. “‘Just a Lap’ is my Guinness World Records attempt to be the first per-
son to solo sail around the world with Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease,” Decker said. “‘Just a Lap’ is 30,000 miles over three years. Each sail, I’m traveling five to six miles per hour for 30,000 miles.” Decker said she has been working on achieving this goal since 2017. She said her goals were to be debt-free, to buy a boat and to save enough money for the trip’s expenses along the way. “I worked traveling nursing assignments. I even went to Alaska and commercial fished for two seasons to make sure I even liked being on a boat, on the sea, exhausted and tired,” Decker said. Decker said she eventually bought her boat in Florida and arrived in the Bahamas on March 12, 2020. She said two days later, the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the world and created a roadblock for Decker’s trip. “I was stuck on my boat in another country with no way to move forward,” Decker said. “I waited two and a half months with the country telling me to be prepared to stay indefinitely with no assistance.” see SAIL on page 3
Men’s basketball knocked out in quarterfinals of OVC tournament AUDREY O’RENIC sports editor For the fourth consecutive year, SIUE men’s basketball clinched a spot in the Ohio Valley Conference championships held at Ford Center, Indiana, last week. The sixth-seeded Cougars took on the seventh-seeded Eastern Illinois University Panthers in the first round on Thursday. The Cougars began with a strong first half, in which redshirt junior guard Ray’Sean Taylor led SIUE with a 2-point shot within the first minute of the game. However, the Panthers caught up by the 4-minute mark, tying the teams at 2-2. After two free throws from EIU and a dunk from fifth-year guard Shamar
Wright, the teams were tied yet again at 4-4. Swiftly, Shamar Wright overtook the final tie of the game with a free throw, giving the Cougars an extra push to lead for the rest of the first half. Taylor locked in the lead by scoring a 3-pointer in the last second of the half, which resulted in a 39-22 score at halftime. Despite a slower second half in which EIU ultimately scored more points than the Cougars did, the Cougars concluded the game with a 68-57 overall victory. Notably, Taylor scored a total of 25 points, making him the highest scorer of the game. Junior guard Damarco Minor also set a career-high record of 14 rebounds.
The Cougars were set to take on third-seeded Morehead State University in the quarterfinals the next day. The first points of the game came in the first 30 seconds from the Eagles. The Cougars missed their first four shots, but a good layup from junior forward Terrance Thompson was able to set the Cougars back on track. Unfortunately, the Cougars could not catch up to the Eagles, and by halftime, the score was 21-34. The Cougars did not let this discourage them, as the second half was much closer than the first. This time, the first few points of the half came from Shamar Wright. However, nearly 20 seconds later, EIU scored a three-pointer.
The rest of the match became neck and neck. As one team would score, the other would quickly follow up with a score of their own. Despite a tough fight from the Cougars, they ultimately fell to the Eagles, 63-78. Taylor led the Cougars again with 19 points — one point away from being the highest scorer for the second consecutive game. Shamar Wright scored 12 points, making him the third-highest scorer in SIUE history with a total of 1,549 points. With a total of 154, he is also the all-time leader in games played. Morehead State University went on to secure the 2024 Men’s Basketball OVC Championship title.