Hoop Dreams: Dan Stoddard shoots for diploma – and baskets, of course

Posted on Wednesday, August 29th, 2018

When Dan Stoddard became Algonquin College’s most famous student last fall, he wasn’t prepared for the attention.

The local media arrived first, then the Globe and Mail. Soon he was getting inquiries from Sports Illustrated and the Washington Post, as well as from newspapers in Europe and India.

Okay, Stoddard thought, I’m a 38-year-old first year business administration student and I made the Algonquin Thunder basketball team. Cute story, but why so much fuss?

He didn’t get it, he says. And then he did. “It was January sometime and I was coming off the court and there were some people who had to be in their 50s. They came over and wanted pictures and stuff. They thought (what I was doing) was great. And that resonated.”

Stoddard realized he was living out the fantasy of a lot of people who’ve reached a certain age, looked back at their lives, and asked themselves: what if? “There are so many people living that life of regret, and this is one of those things I get to change in my life.”

An athletic six-foot-eight basketball star in high school, Stoddard lost sight of any sports dreams after graduation. He married at 20 and was soon raising a family. He worked various jobs, relegating basketball to an occasional recreation activity.

But then in 2017, he was in a position to change all that. As a part-time business student, he realized he was eligible to try out for the college’s basketball team. He was still six-foot-eight, after all, and while he’d lost a step or two and weighed close to 400 pounds, he still had skills, and an enormous will to succeed.

He dropped some weight, tried out, and made the team. Soon “Old Man Dan,” as his fans called him, was giving young teammates lessons in work ethic and discipline. He was getting floor time and scoring some points. People came out specifically to see him play.

It wasn’t easy. Stoddard was holding down a full-time job driving bus for OC Transpo, taking five online courses in his business administration program, going to practices and games, and working out two hours a day on his own. Meanwhile, he was trying to find time for his wife and kids and do home renovations. He was down to five hours of sleep a night.

By mid-season, the effort was taking its toll. “I bit off more than I could chew,” he says.

“It wasn’t until the end of the season when I realized how much it affected my family … my kids and my wife. That part was difficult and took a lot of discussion, but we’re training for another year, so we’ll see what happens.”

Stoddard is giving himself another year to see how far he can take his late-life sports career. He has changed his training schedule and adjusted his routine to make sure he gets enough sleep. If he can improve enough to meet his own high expectations, he may string out his business administration course for a few years so he can keep playing.

Regardless of his success on the court, the now 39-year-old Stoddard is steadily pursuing another long-term goal: to an accountant. His three-year Business Administration diploma from Algonquin can be translated into to a Bachelor’s degree through another year of study with Nipissing University.

If getting back into basketball proved to be harder than he expected, Stoddard says that becoming a student again was easier.

“It’s not as hard as a I thought it would be,” Stoddard says, figuring his lived experience has made it easier. “Somehow I’ve learned how to study better.”

He credits to the College for at least part of his scholastic success. “All the communications with the professors have been straight up and honest. The people I interact with at the school, they’re very generous with their time … (and) they’re more than willing to help out. My interactions with the school have been really good.

Stoddard says he has a life plan that goes well beyond basketball. “Both my kids are going to taking this (Business Administration program). Eventually we’ll have a family business,” he says. “The older you are, that’s the stuff you think about … There’s a laid out thought process for the next 20 years.”

Stoddard counts himself lucky. “I’m getting an opportunity to chase more than one dream right now.”


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