'Sky's the Limit': Carson Sager's NASA summer

WASHINGTON D.C. – Carson Sager had planned to spend the final off-season of his college career in Gallagher-Iba Arena launching three-pointers. Instead, he helped launch space rockets from the nation's capital.

Sager – a senior electrical and computer engineering major from Wichita Falls, Texas – was selected from a pool of nearly 20,000 applicants to take part in NASA's summer internship program. From May through July, he tested AI technology at the Goddard Space Flight Center near Washington D.C. while learning about a wide variety of roles and research within the agency.

"Being able to tour different facilities and different areas of research was just eye-opening," Sager said. "To see how many factors go into sending a rocket into space, as well as how many smart people exist in the world was just the coolest experience."

Sager had initially planned to spend the summer glued to the court inside Gallagher-Iba Arena.

With his senior year approaching, Sager circled the offseason as a chance to build his game and connect with this year's incoming roster. As a result, he kept his name out of the fall and winter internship cycle. Then, in April, Dr. James Stine, an electrical and computer engineering professor at Oklahoma State, approached him with an opportunity.

"One of his friends had a position open at NASA doing kinda similar things to what we'd been doing in class, and he wanted me to apply for it," Sager said. "So, I applied."

So did thousands of others, but Sager defied the odds. He was one of only 450 candidates selected for the prestigious program and a month later he found himself in Greenbelt, Md., crashing a different type of board – integrated circuit.

"I was testing machine learning programs on an FPGA [field-programmable gate array] board," Sager said. "I was basically hardware accelerating these programs in order to have more efficient AI technology onboard the international space station."

When he wasn't testing algorithms, Sager and his team of three other interns were introduced to other facets of operations at Goddard, including material science and cleanroom technology, while also seeing rockets designed from the ground up.

Work and a daily commute from Washington D.C. to Maryland occupied much of Sager's time, but he still found time to make a few memories.

"I was able to go to the Senate and kinda see where everybody's desks were," Sager said. "The Fourth of July in D.C. was amazing – the best firework show I've ever seen. We got to see a launch from the Wallops Space Flight Center. It's about three hours away from D.C., but you could still see the ship going up to deliver some packages to the space station, which only happens every few months. It was great."

Sager also made time for basketball. He swapped the white maple of Gallagher-Iba Arena for a blacktop court hidden behind his apartment. Four to five times per week, he trekked a two-mile path around Lincoln Park.

Those makeshift practices came in handy in early August when he went from the space center to Spain in a span of just 48 hours.

Upon concluding his internship, Sager, joined by his older brother and former Cowboys guard, Christien, stuffed everything into his Toyota Tacoma and ventured 20 hours from Greenbelt to Stillwater, trading off shifts and sleep schedules. Two following day, Sager joined his Cowboy teammates on a 10-hour flight to Madrid for their foreign exhibition tour.

"It was a whirlwind, for sure," Sager said. "That was one of the most tiring adventures I've ever had but also one of the most exciting."

While there was an adjustment period, it didn't take long for Sager to acclimate with his teammates.

"There were a couple culture shocks, because I hadn't been around the guys, and we were in a different country," Sager said. "Luckily, it was just a great trip overall. The coaches and everybody who planned and were involved really provided for us. It was a great experience for team bonding."

Now, as one of OSU's longest-tenured players, Sager has put his experience into practice as a leader within the roster.

"I try to be a leader in any way that I can," Sager said. "Whether that's going over plays with some guys, making sure guys are on time and getting to class, helping guys with class, helping guys on the court – explaining different ideas, basketball plays and how we can be the most efficient team on and off the court."

While Sager has returned to the hardwood of GIA, the days and nights of balancing schoolwork and basketball continue, and work ethic and focus remain key.

"After three hours of classes, I'm not going to be learning digital integrated circuit design on the court, Sager said. "I'm going to be running a pick-and-roll or getting some shots up or playing a zone defense.

"You've got to switch on basketball, put all you can into it, because coaches are giving everything to us. They're putting all their time in for us to get better. I take it as a responsibility to help the team get better as much as I can in any way I can."

As Sager looks to turn his tassel in electrical and computer engineering in the spring, he's keeping his options open heading into the summer. But, as head coach Mike Boynton Jr. puts it, he'll continue to be successful no matter the path.

"I don't say this in any kind of 'coach speak', I think Carson Sager could be successful at literally anything in his life that he decides to be," Boynton said. "Obviously, his path right now is engineering, and I would imagine he's going to pursue that. But, he could stop that and go into banking. He could go into the law world and get a doctorate if he wanted. He could become a professor if he wanted and he'd be really successful. Part of it comes from the foundation of his work ethic, his character, and obviously his desire to be the best at whatever he does."

The sky continues to be the limit for Carson Sager.

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