Crown Point football coach Craig Buzea didn’t know if this day would come.
He was too busy fighting for his life.
Buzea was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia on December 6, 2019.
It’s all a blur to him.
The diagnosis, the subsequent treatment and then the stem cell transplant in July of 2020 are hazy memories.
At the time, Buzea, who spent 16 years coaching at Portage and Michigan City, was the football coach at Homewood-Flossmoor. He started at Crown Point in 2021.
“I don’t remember a lot of it. I was just out of it,” he said. “It was one of those things where death was knocking on my door. You don’t know if you’re going to make it.”
Something Buzea remembers clearly, though, was the call from Mark Grishaber, the principal of Chicago Public Schools’ Taft High School. It came when Buzea was undergoing his first round of Chemotherapy at Chicago’s Northwestern Memorial Hospital.
The two didn’t know each other.
But they shared two common bonds.
They were football coaches and they had AML.
Grishaber had read about Buzea’s story in the newspaper and he was moved.
He wanted to help.
Grishaber got his number and called him after his diagnosis to offer support and to tell him if he had any questions to give him a call.
– Original Credit: Photo courtesy of Mark Grishaber
Grishaber also had former Indianapolis Colts coach Chuck Pagnano, an AML survivor, give Buzea a call. Pagnano, who was the Bears defensive coordinator, had helped Grishaber through some dark days.
Grishaber, who was diagnosed in 2016 and is now in remission, knew how the difficult odds were. Only about 31% of people diagnosed with AML live longer than five years, according to the National Cancer Institute. He said he went into the hospital with four other men and none of them are alive. Grishaber kept that information to himself during his conversation with Buzea.
Buzea said that the doctors basically told him if he didn’t get the transplant, he was “going to die.”
When Grishaber found out Buzea had moved to Crown Point, he talked to him about playing a home and home series to raise awareness for AML.
It took a few years to get their schedules to mesh but the day has arrived.
Taft plays Crown Point on Friday. It’s Taft’s season opener.
Orange decals decorate the player’s helmets. The coaches are going to wear orange t-shirts, sporting the color for leukemia awareness.
Buzea and Grishaber will meet in person for the first time.
Both agree that it’s a great day to be alive and raising money for AML.
“I was diagnosed in 2016,” Grishaber said. “The Cubs had just won the World Series and everyone was happy. Trump had just won the election and everybody was kind of sad or angry or whatever. I didn’t give a crap. I was in the hospital getting Chemotherapy. I didn’t care either way. It just put everything into perspective.”
Yes, this about perspective.
Buzea is glad he’s alive to promote this cause.
He said the key to him sticking around was getting a donor for his stem cell transplant. The five-year survival rate for successful stem cell transplant recipients is 65%, according to the National Library of Medicine. A good stem cell transplant is a lifeline.
Buzea was lucky. His donor was an 18-year-old male who was a perfect match. Matches are measured from one to 10 with one being the worst. His match was a 10.
If Buzea had to hone in on a message about AML, it’s for people to consider donating.
“I got to know a lot of people that had this disease, and many of them died,” he said. “A lot of it was because of a lack of a donor. The more people we have donate, the bigger the chance we have to find a match for the people that have this. I want to bring awareness to this issue.”
The process for signing up to be a stem cell plant donor is just a cheek swab that is sent off to a registry. Ordering the kit for the registry can be done online.
According to Be The Match Registry, there are more than 9 million potential donors in the U.S., with those between the ages of 18 and 35 the most sought after as research shows that these donors provide the greatest chance for transplant success. As the genetic markers used in matching are inherited, donors are most likely to match someone who shares the same ethnic background.
Buzea just had a checkup last week and he’s cancer-free.
He’ll always be cancer-aware, though. Remission doesn’t start until five years after the diagnosis.
Buzea is finishing year three.
His work habits have changed. He no longer watches film until 2 a.m. and he tires a little more easily than he used to.
He delegates more and he appreciates every moment, even the difficult ones, more.
Football almost killed him but in the end, it kept him alive.
He had to force himself to go to the hospital in 2019 after H-F lost its second playoff game. “That’s the only game in my career that I wanted to lose,” he said. “Knowing the way I operate, if we had kept going in the playoffs, I would’ve died.”
Buzea considers himself fortunate.
The donor match was perfect, there were no serious complications with the transplant and he’s still doing what he wants, which is coaching football.
His goal is to help more AML patients get the transplant, finish the cancer fight strong and keep on coaching until he can’t do it anymore.
He knows how this could end and he takes nothing for granted anymore.
Mike Hutton is a freelance reporter and columnist for the Post-Tribune.
If you go
Tickets: $7, available at https://bit.ly/44jkUhU or at the gate. Crown Point High School is a cashless gate — please bring a credit/debit card.
When: A special Leukemia presentation begins at 6:50 p.m. before kickoff at 7 p.m.
To donate: Individuals who would like to donate online to the CPHS football fundraiser for Be the Match can go to https://bit.ly/45gLGsr.
