It was the most competitive three days of my life, basketball tryouts. This is the first time my friends and I were trying out for a school team, we were all hyped for basketball season. I entered the tryout excited and consequently energetic. Adrenaline was pulsing through all the players bodies, there were 6 foot tall 8th graders with years of experience competing against 6th graders who have never touched a basketball before for the same spots. I was in between, I was a 6th grader that had experience along with some skill. That was also my downfall, I went in overconfident and consequently cocky. I wasn’t planning on getting cut, I walked into the tryout overwrought, nothing could stop me from being on the team. It was the first and the
worst day of tryouts for everyone. Anxiety and stress were only a few of the emotions that people endured. The coaches watched us like hawks, nobody wanted to make a mistake. I made myself believe I was doing well, yet in reality I was dissatisfactory toward the coaches. I never realized why I was doing poorly until the second day of the try outs. After doing suicides coach gave us a short water break which allowed the players to talk, I overheard a conversation about how much kids had practiced. Some of the athletes had been working for a year to make the team, I didn’t feel like practicing. Practicing wasn’t worth it to me, sports always were easy for me. Failure was ever an option for me and this time wasn’t different. I was panic stricken, but I didn’t lose confidence. I questioned everything I did to “prepare” for the try out. Day three hit everyone like a truck, the day all the players were waiting for was also the day everyone was dreading; It was the day the rosters were announced. Coach Fennel had all the players gather together, he congratulated us on our sustained effort and prepared to tell us the rosters. My friends and I were excited, we could all play on the same team and hang out together. The first team (Varsity) had been announced, the players stood up with pride as the were called; I never stood up. I became uneasy, then the JV list was announced. My friends stood up and cheered with excitement, I remained seated. I got cut. For the first time in my sports career I had been cut from a team, I felt worthless and awful. Over the next couple of days I came to the realization that I should have practiced, I let my over confidence get the better of me and I was forced to pay the price. This experience changed my approach on everything in my life, I began to work harder and not take no for an answer. I fought as hard as I could not only for basketball, but in life. Cockiness and overconfidence were things of the past, I became a new person. The very next year when I tried out, I worked harder than any other player, and it paid off. I was able to make varsity.
On my first year of middle school, I was so excited because I finally could try out to be on a school softball team. I never played travel ball, only recreation softball so I've never actually been on a team that I tried out for. Over the summer I went to batting practice and fielding to get ready for the year. This is my year, I thought ready to tryout and make the team. The day came to where I had to show what I could do to the coaches. It took a while for the tryouts to actually commence because there was so much rain that week that it kept getting pushed back. This made more nervous, I just wanted to get it over with. I worked hard throughout the tryouts, but when I went up to bat I could not hit the ball. I tried many times but I couldn't do it. I felt terrible because everyone else hit great. I was embarrassed. I freaked out, this is what could ruin my chance to be on the team. Even then I still tried my best.
Coming off the high of the old season, tryouts seemed like a practice that I could halfway do, and expect to come out with impressive results. I played decently, blocked some shots on defense, and even pulled out a couple of fancy moves to trick the midfielders whilst dribbling up the field. Our first of three water breaks then came 20 minutes into the tryout. Numerous of my former teammates came to me, babbling about how unconfident they felt. After reassuring that they certainly made the rostered team, they reiterated the same
Go big or go home is my motto for the night. Everything I do at this tryout will affect the rest of my junior year and all of senior year. “Hands on your hips, a smile on your lips, spirit in your heart, let’s start,” plays through my mind as the judges stare at you and the person with whom you are trying out. This journey begins several hours before, at the beginning of the day.
The next day I came bright and early at six thirty in the morning. Just as the sun creaked its bright light I walked through the old rusted door of our glorious school gym only to find half the school in wait to begin tryouts. I was nervous, almost scared. What if I’m warmed up, what if I’m not steady, what if I’m too cold, right there and then every single horrible situation flashed before my eyes. Whether it was me tripping over my untied shoelaces or a state of the art jet crashing through the ceiling only giving bodily injury to me. But before i knew it tryouts were over and not a single thing had gone wrong. To this day I still can’t remember a single thing i did in practice that year. Walking out the door I came to an abrupt halt as coach stops me with a serious face as usual.
Last year, I tried out for TSC ( short for Tennessee Soccer Club). TSC is considered as one of the best, if not the best, soccer clubs in Tennessee for many reasons: its championship winning teams, its top notch facilities, and its player's collegiate success to state a few. I was confident that I was going to make the showcase team. This confidence came from the fact that I knew many players on the showcase team and had competed against many of them, so I knew what to expect at tryouts. The tryouts lasted three days, and there were more than 200 players competing for a spot on one of the two teams in my age group. After tryouts had concluded, the coaches informed us that they would be calling players to let us know if we made the showcase
Nervous: tending to be anxious; highly strung. The word nervous couldn’t even begin to describe how I felt going into my freshman year cheerleading tryouts. It was late March in 2011 as I was leaving middle school and entering high school. I had cheered since I was little all through elementary school and all through middle school, so when the time had come for high school tryouts I was a nervous wreck. Not only were tryouts a full week, but they also consisted of learning a dance, two side-line cheers, the school fight song and a “big” cheer. I can remember tryouts being absolutely miserable for me, because they fell on Easter Break. That year for Easter I was flying to visit my dad in San Diego, but I was leaving on the second day of tryouts.
Four days after practicing the tryouts came and BOOM! I nailed it. Me and only three out of the seven girls from my grade made the JV team. I might sound like a cocky little ass hole right now, but trust me I actually have really good sportsmanship skills and I did not say I was the best in front of the girls that didn’t make
Back in 6th grade I tried out for the baseball team. I was a decent pitcher and fielder. The problem was there was only one team, varsity. So it was the best kids from the three grades competing for a mere 13 spots. On the last day of tryouts I had busted my ass of.
I was never as good as most of my friends were at soccer because I was younger and not as strong as they were, but I always trained twice as hard, watched most of the skills on TV and tried to apply them on the field to ensure that I was always on the same level with them. One day, when most of I and my teammates were called for the national team U15 tryout, I was so excited because I thought that was my chance of breaking through to be seen by agents. Unfortunately, I was among the first kids that were cut because I wasn't physically strong enough. This was the most challenging time of my life because I felt like all my efforts, time, and hard work was for nothing. On that day, I didn't even eat or sleep in my house.
When I was a little kid I would go onto my mom’s computer and I type “ESPN” into the search engine. NBA would pop on the top on the screen and I would click it. NBA is my favorite sport to watch. I would look at the teams that were scheduled to play that night. The thing that always interested me is the over-under of the game and the percent chance of which team that would win the game. The one thing that always confused me was who in the world can the calculate something like that. I always tried asking my dad about it, but it was always too complicated for me to understand. Nothing really in grade school math further explained my yearning for an answer to how people calculate a team’s chances of winning. My first two years of high
It was an early Saturday morning in the school gymnasium. A rusty smell lingered in the air from the perspiration from the game prior. I was about to play my last ever game of high school basketball. This would have been nothing out of the ordinary until this happened...
I went to the first tryout pretty scared, I didn’t know how much competition there was going to be. Once I had arrived I met some new friends and I also met other people that I already had knew. Surprisingly, there was only 6 people that came to the first tryout… that wasn’t even enough for a full team. We still went on, we did some practicing with our dribbling and shooting, we spent about an hour and half doing the same thing over and over again. I was exhausted and it was time to go home. It was around 9pm and I was tired from all the running so I decided to take a nap on the car ride. After the car ride I went up to my room, changed, and
Six long hours after departing Hotchkiss, we finally reached our destination. We pulled into the parking lot of the Super 8 just off Interstate 76 in Sterling, Colorado. Since I had been to this hotel on a previous trip to Sterling, I began wishing I had brought my swimsuit along. Mom and dad went inside and got the keys for room 129. I was so sick of riding in the car that I did not care what the room looked like as long as there was a bed for me to sleep on. As we entered the room, on the left there was the bathroom sink, a mirror, and a place to hang our "good" clothes. To the right, was the miniature bathroom. There was not enough space in there for a midget. Stepping out of the entranceway, there was a wooden dresser with a 27-inch television. By the large window, there was a small table. Two queen size beds sat on either side of the nightstand. The purple patterned quilts were quite shocking compared to everything else in the room.
All I remember is the buzzer ringing, and the crowd cheering. We were just about to win our basketball game. It was the championship game. All I had to do was make that 3, and we would take the win. I was standing on the line, about to shoot. There were 2.4 seconds left until the end of the game. Suddenly, the ball left my hands, soaring through the air. Then everything blacked out. I couldn’t see a thing. I slightly remember falling and hearing a thud, but nothing else.
All that hard work for nothing. I finally felt how feels to lose. During the summer, I started putting in extra work so that we could be the best team. I didn’t even have a basketball hoop back then so to practice my shooting I would go find a park where there was a basketball hoop and shoot there. In seventh grade, I was once again the best player on the team and the second game of the season, I had a moment that I will never forget. I was on fire that game. I couldn’t miss a shot. I felt the fire inside of me. In the fourth quarter, the other team took a two point lead with ten seconds to go. Our coach said, “Harsh you’re going to hit the game winning shot.” I was getting nervous. I felt my hands beginning to tremble. We had to win the game though. My friend got the ball and he passed it to me. I crossed my man over and hit a three. We won the game and everyone went crazy. I will never forget how excited I was after the game. Later that year, we lost in the first round of the playoffs. We were the best team and we still lost. Even though I got trophy for the most valuable player, I was breathing fast. was shocked and disappointed. This was yet another setback. That summer, I moved schools. There