Eric cannot remember a time when he was not playing sports. Little league baseball, soccer, basketball and football led to his true calling: swimming and water polo. In his senior year he slipped while diving into the pool for warm ups at a water polo tournament. His head hit the bottom of the pool, breaking his neck at the C6-7 level and leaving him paralyzed from the chest down. Eric was able to graduate with his high school class and move on to Merced Community College where he majored in communications. That competitive fire was alive and he tried all sorts of adapted sports but nothing was quite like wheelchair rugby. Eric transferred to the University of Arizona where he is majoring in Communications and Sociology and competing on the wheelchair rugby team.