Byline: Patrick Reusse; Staff Writer
Heidi Olhausen and Kate Callahan were freshmen for the University of Minnesota volleyball team in the fall of 1992. They had been teammates at Lakeville High, and now they were roommates in an aging dorm room at the university.
'You should see the room,' Callahan said. 'There are pretzels all over the floor. Our clothes are in piles everywhere. People come in the room and they scream.'
Later in this conversation, Olhausen and Callahan were offering a strong endorsement for the good looks of Cameron Green, a volleyball player from Redondo Beach, Calif.
Callahan had lived in Redondo Beach until 1990 and went to a prom with Green. Olhausen had met him at the U.S. junior volleyball summer camp.
Asked whether this fond recollection of Green meant things were 'dull socially' at the university, the two first-semester collegians laughed, and Callahan said:
'We didn't put all those pretzels on the floor ourselves, you know.'
This week, Heidi was asked whether Callahan still was around. She offered an enthused 'yes' and said: 'Kate married a California guy, and they moved back here two years ago. She just had a baby. She's so much fun. It's great having her back.'
Heidi found her husband at Gopherville - Trevor Winter, the 7-foot basketball player from the bustling burg of Slayton, Minn. They were married in the summer of 1997, after Trevor's final, memorable basketball season with the Gophers.
The honeymoon took place in Spain, with Trevor playing for a team in Pamplona and Heidi playing briefly for a team in Bilbao.
There were other teams and basketball camps for Winter, including a turn with the Timberwolves in 1998-99. He spent time stashed on the injured list and played in one game.
Daughter Macy was born in the winter of 2001. Trevor had an invitation to Cleveland's training camp. In September, Heidi did some unexpected bleeding and went to an emergency room. There was not much alarm, and she was told to go in for a checkup.
Cancer. The cells were connected to the pregnancy - a form of cancer that's ultra-rare.
'The cancer had spread to a lung, where I had a 4-inch tumor, to my bladder, to an eye ... a lot of places,' Heidi said. 'They don't tell you that you're going to die. They say, `It's going to be difficult.' '
Trevor was due in Cleveland's NBA camp when Heidi was early in her chemotherapy treatments. 'He had to go,' she said. 'Someone needed to pay the bills. That was our livelihood.'
Heidi and Macy lived with her folks for a month. Trevor broke his wrist with the Cavaliers. He came home. His father-in-law helped hook up Trevor with a job as a pharmaceutical salesman for Pfizer.
Heidi's oncologist was Cheryl Bailey at Abbott-Northwestern. The brand of poison she ordered to attack the cancer took Heidi's hair.
'Eyebrows and all,' she said. 'Trevor would shave my head and say, `This looks so great.' He could get a laugh out of me with that. In this situation, there are days when one person is higher than the other. We had to take care of each other.
'Trevor and I both come from very religious families. We leaned on our faith. Instead of waking up every day, wondering, `Why me?' I was able to look at it as, `Why not me?' '
The poison administered at Abbott-Northwestern did more than take Heidi's hair. After six months, it killed the cancer.
'Cheryl Bailey is the best,' Heidi said. 'I would not have made it through without her knowledge, her advice, her encouragement.'
Heidi said that Winter, the world's tallest pharmaceutical salesman, greatly enjoys his non-basketball profession.
'Trevor played basketball because he was 7 feet tall and he was expected to,' she said. 'He enjoyed the experiences, the relationships, but the game ... Trevor was happy to quit.'
The Winters were told to wait for two years before Heidi tried to undertake another pregnancy. 'After that, we went by our faith; if it was supposed to happen, it would,' she said.
It happened. Heidi is now eight months pregnant. 'Big as a house,' she said.
As for the past connection between pregnancy and cancer, she said: 'Of course, it's in my thoughts, but it was such a rare occurrence ... and they tell us the odds of it happening again are as remote with this baby as they were when I was having Macy.'
Heidi was a standout hitter on the Gophers volleyball team that reached the NCAA's final 16 in 1993. When women's athletic director Chris Voelz fired coach Stephanie Schleuder a year later, Heidi pulled no punches in publicly criticizing Voelz.
Olhausen's career ended in 1995 - the lost season between the departure of the personable, competent Schleuder and the dynamic, high-priced Mike Hebert.
'I don't know Hebert at all, but it's pretty incredible what he has done with the program,' Heidi said. 'The game itself - I watch on television and I'm amazed, it has changed so much.
'The players up front are so tall and athletic. I was tall at 5-11 a decade ago. Now, I would be a shrimp.'
Heidi paused. 'We're hoping Macy will hold up the volleyball end of things for us,' she said. 'She should have the height, with Trevor as her daddy.'
Then, Heidi Winter laughed ... laughed as though she was again a college kid exchanging quips with her pal Callahan.
Patrick Reusse can be heard weekdays on AM-1500 KSTP at 6:45 and 7:45 a.m. and 5:40 p.m. He is at preusse@startribune.com.
