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What High School Sports Taught Me

The Good, the Bad, and the Favoritism

By Maddie A.Published 6 years ago 3 min read
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Growing up, I was active in many sports including volleyball, swimming, soccer, softball, tennis, and archery, but nothing brought me as much joy as basketball. It was the one sport I had played in middle school that stuck with me through high school; but it wasn't all about building me up as an athlete, it was also about bringing down myself as well.

Teamwork...does it always make the dream work?

OK, so I'm 6'1 which is way above the national average height for a girl according to Medical News Today. As soon as I got to tryouts, the coaches were all paying attention to me. I mean, it was kind of hard to miss the tallest girl on the court. Yet I was still wondering why? I wasn't the best player, I'll admit it. I worked hard at home and went to every practice but I also had a life outside of basketball. Well, I figured out real quick that if the coaches know you're not giving it 110 percent, then you're pretty much a low priority. Every other girl who was giving it their all though, was getting full one-on-one sessions with the coaches during practices, while the rest of us just got yelled at for messing up. Instead of coaching us as a whole team or giving us all the amount of attention they gave other players, maybe it would have been a star 12-player team instead of a star 5-player team.

Why even bother asking for help sometimes...

You ask, and ask, over and over, what can you do to improve? Yet, is the advice they tell you actually going to help make you better? Or does it just make you feel like you're highlighting your flaws and making the already "star players" look even better. I already knew that I didn't want to continue playing basketball going into college as I was getting a scholarship in something else I was passionate about, but after my coaches found this out, it was see ya later! This led to me getting cut to be on the varsity team my senior year. So I just want to openly say a huge "thank you" to my coaches, who let me go to pursue my other passions and give 110 percent to things that motivated me to become a successful person.

Dreaming—Believing—Doing

I just would now like to say thank you to my coaches, though. Now I have a newfound passion in other things. Now do I look back and think that I could have tried harder? All the time. Yet do I regret my decisions? Not one bit. After not making the team my senior year, I had so much more time to focus on the things that really mattered to me. My takeaway from this article is not to just dabble in everything you want to try to find what you're good at and like doing, but to also not let others hold you back and tell you that you can't do things. Make your life what you want, not what others want it to be.

basketball
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About the Creator

Maddie A.

Agriculture, traveling, and sports are my thing.

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