Following last year’s canceled spring sport season, coaches and athletes discuss concerns for the upcoming season

With spring season tryouts set for the week of March 1, current sophomores, juniors and seniors are left with uncertainty following last year’s canceled season. 

Because rosters and tryouts aren’t being taken into consideration from last spring, according to head soccer coach Jamie Kelly, no spot is guaranteed. While coaches look at the current freshman class, the lack of knowledge of last season’s team dynamic challenges them in their efforts to put together teams.

“Not only do we have freshmen that are new this year but the sophomores are still kinda new, so we have two sets of classes who are going through it at the same time,” Kelly said.

For athletes like junior Greer Hembree, the cancelation of last soccer season left her uncertain of what would come this year. As a freshman, Hembree was playing up on varsity, but come last year’s tryout, she was put on the JV roster. 

“Personally I feel like I improved freshman year,” Hembree said. “We only got two weeks of practice [last season], and that didn’t get to show all our skills. With tryouts I’m always a little bit nervous, but this year I feel a lot more confident because I’m an upperclassmen and I kinda have experience and I kinda know how it goes.”

Confused and upset about the team change at first, Hembree is headed into this year’s season with the hopes of claiming a varsity spot.

“We graduated with nine or 10 seniors last year, so there are nine or 10 girls that are gonna move up. We’ve [also] got all these new freshmen we haven’t seen play before and have to see how their talent stacks up against everybody,” Kelly said. “If you made a team last year, we aren’t going to guarantee you a spot either. You still have to go out and improve yourself.”

Without an underclassman season to show their skill, many returning players feel that they’re at a disadvantage. Senior and returning varsity lacrosse player Zak Beil can also attest to how important underclassmen years are when it comes to improving in your sport. 

“Being on the [lacrosse] team my sophomore year, it was more me getting experience and building team chemistry,” Beil said. “How I looked upon [last year’s season ending] was I knew I’d at least have another year.”

Beil’s concern for the season isn’t about if he’ll make the team or what position he’ll end up playing, but how his teammates will adjust after losing the chance to bond last season, now that there are new sophomores and freshmen who need to adjust to the team dynamic.

Last year the boys said goodbye to some powerful seniors and a coach who took them all the way to the championships, so they’ll have to put in work before the season in preparation according to Beil.

“In a normal year you’d kind of have an understanding of who is gonna be on varsity and who is gonna be on JV,” East’s new varsity lacrosse coach, Patrick Schmitt, said. “But with last year being canceled, there is a big stepping stone for those kids in development that missed out on a year and some of these freshmen have yet to put on any kind of jersey.”

Schimtt has been running optional practices held on Fridays to help prepare the boys for the season, and work around this disconnect from the loss of last season. 

“[The optional practice] is a chance to get guys’ touches on the stick and kinda get used to their teammates because with last season getting canceled, some of these sophomores have never played varsity before and now are expected to be leaders at a senior level, so I’m trying to bridge that gap as much as possible,” Schmitt said. 

To prepare for tryouts, Schmitt recommends players join a workout program, work independently or watch film as the season approaches. Since he knows adjusting to the new team dynamic will take work, he encourages players to be as athletically prepared as possible.

According to Kelly, when East returns to hybrid learning on Jan. 26, Athletic Director Debbie Katzfey has okayed girls soccer to begin conditioning under COVID protocol. While most sports provide some type of pre-season training, you can find more specific information about pre-tryout information and conditioning on each individual spring sport’s Twitter account.