UW Men’s Basketball staffer is “living his truth” as a gay man – WMTV – NBC15

June 25, 2021 News Editor

MADISON, Wis. (WMTV) – A member of the UW Men’s Basketball staff is living his truth. June is Pride Month so Marc VandeWettering wrote an article to describe his journey as a gay man.

“Sitting down and writing this in the midst of Pride Month is liberating,” he wrote in the article.

The 29-year-old says there are not many people like him in his profession and that needs to change. “I looked around men’s college basketball and there was no one else “out” like me,” he wrote in his article.

He works as the team’s Director of Basketball Operations. He says of the 357 Division I schools, he’s the only openly gay man on a men’s basketball staff.

“I’m the only one who is openly gay, but there are more gay people out there,” he said. “I know I’m not the first, but I’m currently the only…as far as I know,”

He recently wrote an article entitled My Words: Living My Truth. In the article, he describes his journey as a gay man. He says the response has been overwhelmingly positive.

VandeWettering works as the Director of Operations for UW Men's Basketball team — VandeWettering works as the Director of Operations for UW Men’s Basketball team(Kelli Steffes/UW Athletics)

“It’s hard to keep up. Going to bed last night, I probably still had dozens, if not hundreds of messages, to respond to,” VandeWettering said. “The number of coaches that have already reached out has been so powerful,”

He says he knew he was gay from a young age but struggled to accept the truth. “I didn’t really want to believe it, I didn’t want to think it was true,” he says.

He finally accepted that he was gay in 2015 and came out to his family in December of that year.

“You feel like the world finally opens up and there’s bright new colors when you finally take that step when you tell those closest to you,” he said.

VandeWettering hired to the UW staff in 2017. “(Head Coach) Greg Gard was great. He evaluated me for the job and that was it,”

VandeWettering grew up in Kaukauna, Wisconsin(UW Athletics)

Vandewettering said he wrote this article on the UW website to coincide with Pride Month. He says he wants anyone who might be struggling with living their truth to know that support is out there.

“There are people here for you. Reach out to them, connect with them, talk to them. They want to help,” he said. “If you’re ready for it, we are ready for it,”