"Ask Not For Whom the BELL Tolls:
The WARREN BELL Decision"

By Bryan Jerrod Harvey
NCCU Sports Information

On August 19, 1977 in Charlotte, North Carolina, a future athlete was born to William and Carrie Bennett. Their baby boy will grow up to play, and excel, in sports such as football, basketball, baseball and track & field.

Lawrence Nicholson Photo Warren Bell

As a teenager he became a letter-winner in basketball, football and track & field at Olympic High School in Charlotte. On the hardwood, he claimed Team Captain honors for two seasons (1994-95, 1995-96). The young man also used his track & field skills in basketball to be crowned Slam Dunk Champion at the Charlotte All-Star Game in his senior season. He earned football honors such as All-County First Team (1994), All-Conference (1993), and two-year Team Captain. He broke Charlotte-Olympic's school passing record by completing 98 of 180 passes for 1,413 yards and 21 touchdowns.

His tremendous athletic prowess earned the adolescent a chance to go to college and play football and basketball at North Carolina Central University in Durham, NC. The teenager would become the NCCU basketball team's steals leader after his sophomore season, and the free throw percentage leader after his junior campaign.

He became the starting quarterback for the NCCU football team in just his second season. After the 1998 football season, however, things took an unfortunate turn for the Charlotte native. It was now time for the Charlotte boy to become a man, facing the toughest decision in his young life.

Warren Bell, a two-sport athlete for the NCCU "Eagles" in basketball and football, was diagnosed with a Pars Defect, a fracture of the vertebrae in his lower back. Bell, now a senior at NCCU, dealt with the nagging back injury from the middle stages of the 1998 football season and throughout the 1998-1999 basketball season.

The life-long athlete was told by doctors that if he took too many hard hits during the upcoming 1999 football season, there may be health problems in his future. So, with pain in his heart and words, Warren Bell announced on August 10, 1999, that he would not return to play football at NCCU.

Bell's experience could have been much used by the young Eagle team under the direction of new head coach Rudy Abrams. Bell would have been the only quarterback on the team to actually have completed a pass in collegiate play.

In his three years as an Eagle (1996-98), Bell completed 229 of 507 passes for 2,916 and 13 touchdowns. With these numbers, the athletic Bell earned a seventh place position in the university's all-time passing yards record book, ranking among such renowned quarterbacks such as Earl Harvey, Gerald Fraylon and Brad McAdams.

The decision was already made in Bell's mind, but he felt that a talk with his parents would reassure what he already felt and dreaded to avow in his heart. Bell had a heart-to-heart talk with his parents at their home in Charlotte, where he told his mother and father about the severity of the injury to his back and listened to what they had to say about what his decision should be.

"My final step in making my decision was my parents," said the Charlotte native about his family and their decision. "They were the number one reason for me making my final decision, but I needed to hear it from a loved one."

For the senior two-sport stand-out, there was another reason for arriving at his decision about not playing football in the fall. "My mother is currently out of work because of a back injury," said the discouraged Bell. "So, I listened to her opinion of the situation, and I took it to heart." Seeing his mother in pain with her back injury, Bell stated that he did not want to have the same thing happen to him that is happening to his mother.

North Carolina Central University fans surely missed the young athlete from the gridiron in the 1999 football season, but every Eagle fan can rest assure that Bell missed them as well. "This was my first time not playing football since I can remember ... I think since I was eight years-old," quotes the football player at heart.

"For me to go out there [NCCU's O'Kelly-Riddick Stadium] to see the guys practicing and playing was hard. I am used to having people scream and cheer for me. I have never been able to cheer for my own school before because I was always playing. But at the same time it was the decision that I made, and the decision that I have to live with."

Bell missed the football field, but he knew that by permitting his back time to revitalize itself during the off-season, that he would be allowing his body the ability to devote more attention to his upcoming basketball season. "Even though I wasn't playing football, I knew that basketball was always there if I just allowed myself time to recover from the injury," said the rejuvenated basketball player. "I am just happy to still be playing sports. I love the atmosphere (in NCCU's McLendon-McDougald Gymnasium), and there is nothing like it the world. Coming out of that locker room, hearing the crowd, and feeling the adrenaline after a dunk is the best in the world."

This basketball season brought a surprise to Bell. The guard/small forward played the first game of the season with the Eagle basketball team for the first time in his college career. Bell, usually immersed with football, was never able to participate in practices or games until the season started. "It was different for me to be able to come out for the first practice, the first game, and so forth," says the Eagle Team Captain.

Despite injury, Bell has bounced back to have a promising basketball season for the Eagles, who currently have a record of 8-3 overall, and 5-0 in CIAA play (as of Jan. 14). Entering his fourth basketball season at NCCU, Bell is savoring every bit of his final college experience by averaging 7.0 points, grabbing 6.1 rebounds, and dishing out 3.0 assists per game.

Bell is pursuing a career in basketball after college, but he understands that having a college degree will be a blessing for him and his family. "I'm the first one out of three brothers and one sister, all older, to go to college," says the future NCCU graduate.

Majoring in Sports Management, Bell will see his name on a piece of paper that signifies he has completed college studies from North Carolina Central University in the Spring of 2000.

"Basketball and other sports have prepared me for life," says the NCCU student-athlete. "I think that Coach [Greg] Jackson said it best when he said, 'Pressure is not a basketball game. Pressure is when you get out into the real world and you experience things. Some people are going to lay down and quit when faced with difficult challenges, and others are going to jump into the harder situations and take them head on.' And that is true."

Bell realizes that college is coming to an end, but he is not worried about that day. He knows that college has done more for him than he could ever imagine. He has had a great experience in sports, enjoyed his social life, and achieved in the classroom. "After I leave college I want to play basketball, but I will also have a college degree to fall back on. That means that I can get a good-paying job, and live like everybody else in the world ... as an everyday person." The decision that Warren Bell made on that day in August of 1999 is one that he will have to live with for the rest of his life. There is no way of predicting whether or not Bell would have taken the hit that may have been "the one" to end his playing career. Looking back, however, Bell is confident that he made the right decision.