Degree salvaged from lost season for Holloway
The last time most Aggie fans heard the name Dionte Holloway was likely in connection with his arrest for possession of marijuana last spring and his subsequent expulsion from the football team. Although the arrest cost him his senior year of eligibility, Holloway elected to stick it out at USU and will graduate with a 2.9 GPA and a degree in sociology.
“After my senior season was snatched away from me, I just felt empty. I just felt lost, and I felt hurt because I abandoned everything from where I was from to turn myself over to this program and give it all to them, and they basically cut me off with no hesitation,” Holloway said.
Holloway says Coach Brent Guy kicked him off the team despite allowing nine other players caught for similar offenses to continue playing ball. Not long after quarterback Jerod Walker was arrested and eventually charged with aggravated sexual assault, Holloway and Walker were arrested and charged with possession of marijuana.
Guy’s two-strike policy is well-known after USU’s football program has weathered a series of off-field incidents resulting in Walker, Holloway and Tony Pennyman being kicked off recently. Holloway said the possession charge was his first strike.
So why did Holloway stay on at USU and continue working toward his degree after his original reason for coming here was taken away?
“I looked within myself and prayed about it. I told myself I would make it out of here and not let these people get to me. There were only two weeks left in the semester, so I didn’t have to see a lot of people’s faces, but still the hurt and the pain was hard to deal with, and I think I really found myself within myself. I found that inner part that burns me to keep me going. I wasn’t going to let them stop me; what they had no control over, my education, I wouldn’t let them control,” he said.
Holloway said he received a raw deal in court due to not having any support from the Athletic Department, which helped the other players with their cases.
“When everything happened, I didn’t even know where to find an attorney at. Nobody lent a helping hand to let me know what to do. Nobody came to my aide. When they’re done with you, they’re done with you. It was easy for them. But as far as the other players who were caught for the same offense, one of them even more than me, but are still on the team, they got help and aide, and their court cases were a breeze. They didn’t serve any jail time. I did,” Holloway said.
After his publicized arrest, Holloway said he knew people were talking about him. “It’s strange how you never really notice how people know who you are until you do something wrong. I’m a person that can see and hear pretty well and I could hear my name being spoken of and fingers pointing. It’s embarrassing. I couldn’t fight for myself. What could I say?”
One person who tried to help Holloway was one of his professors, Doctor Robert Schmidt, who met Holloway while the wide receiver was a student in his ENVS 3600 class.
“Dionte is one of those students who, if he missed class, would come up and apologize. He would come and talk to me about his grades, and he was one of those in class who would raise his hand and participate,” Schmidt said.
After his arrest, Holloway came to speak to Schmidt about his problems.
“I think he was far from home. He was anxious to talk to his parents about it. He just really didn’t have anyone to talk to,” Schmidt said.
Schmidt tried to give Holloway a helping hand, writing a letter on his behalf to Guy, and said Guy “responded to me and said ‘thank you so much for this letter, I want you to know we take that into advisement. There are lots of things we pay attention to when we make these decisions. We don’t take them lightly.’ I never had a sense that people were out to get Dionte.”
Holloway’s path to USU began when he signed with Fresno State coming out of high school but left after the ’03-’04 season.
“I just wasn’t happy in the way that Pat Hill wanted to run his system, and I figured I could be somewhere to put me in a better position. So I left and I went to the JC in Fresno, Fresno City College, and played there one year, and I got recruited to come here. It was between UTEP, Southern Miss or Kansas State. I chose here because I felt that it would be the best situation for me with a year and a half of school left to come right in as an impact player,” Holloway said.
He chose Utah State over the more established programs because he “felt that this program was on its way with a new era of coaches and a new era of players. I felt it would be a good way to start something off, but obviously it didn’t end up that way.”
After a junior campaign in which he caught 10 balls for 194 yards and a team-high 19.4 yards per catch average, Holloway said he was having a good spring leading up to the fateful arrest.
He said he regrets choosing USU every day.
“Not only are UTEP and Southern Miss good solid programs, but I have family and people out there in those areas that I would have been well taken care of. I regret coming out here to a small town. After everything happened to me, I felt that I made a decision without doing my homework,” Holloway said.
As for the future, Holloway said he will go back to school in California and get his minor in business, which was his original major before he couldn’t get admitted to the USU school of business and had to switch to sociology.
Schmidt said he is “delightfully surprised” that Holloway kept working at school and will graduate from USU.
“It’s a wonderful thing, because with all the other stuff we do, it’s not supposed to take away from the prize at the end, which is a degree which is useful in having a great life. The fact that Dionte is finishing means that he recognizes that it’s not just football; it’s about opening the next chapter of your life. And so hurrah hurrah.”