By Amahry Spencer, Currier Times Staff///

August 11th, 2024, was a day of long trials and tribulations and hard work at the Katz Gym at Curry College. It was a big day for me, and it was all that I have been training for through this past year.  

Trying out for a collegiate organized level team isn’t and, will never be, an easy task especially when you are fresh out of high school with no college experience. You must be in incredibly good shape and know how to run the drills correctly and do it with efficiency to even see your name on a college roster, let alone to being able to play in the game.  

The jump from high school sports to college, coming from an athlete who has not been recruited or noticed enough, and who has not been appreciated enough for their hidden talent, is a big problem that is rarely or never talked about in society.

The media focuses on the “next LeBron James” or the 5-star recruits because they catch everyone’s attention, but nobody in the media really talks about the underdogs of the teams who do not get the respect that they deserve.

When I was trying out for the Curry Men’s Basketball Team, I was practicing with the guys who were already on the team from the previous year, the five first-year students who were already recruited by the Coaches, and the four people who made the final cut (including me). 

It was really a combined practice with everyone; it is just labeled a “tryout.” Other than the people who were already on the team there were not that many people who were trying out for the team.  

To warm up we started off with stretching and went right into the first drill. This is where you take two basketballs and dribble it consecutively down and up the court and when you are done with that first rep, you must do 15 burpees (popping back up to your feet after diving for a loose ball) while the next group starts their rep. I paid attention to everyone and how they were doing the drills; I noticed some of the people who were already on the team looking slightly fatigued doing the drills but they were still doing it efficiently. 

To my surprise, I was slightly underperforming compared to the people that were already on the team in which I am usually one of the top performers in high school. Recently this past year, I have been playing through my patellar tendonitis (jumpers’ knee) which causes me to have sharp knee pain in my patellar tendonitis when I overuse it.  With that said, I never used it as an excuse, so I just played regularly.  

After we were done with all the drills, we did sprints (17 down and back in under 1 minute and 30 sec) in which I put all my energy into it and came second, a little behind one of the players on the team. I was starting to feel fatigued, like most of the people there, after consecutive drills and the sprints right after, but I felt it the most because I was not used to the college level workouts. 

When we were off our 2-minute water break, the coaches split us up into 2 teams to play each other in a 5v5 scrimmage. I was first to start in the 5v5 (which I was kind of surprised) and I was lined up against one of the players that was on the Curry Team. We were required to run the drills that they taught us during the tryout and apply during the 5v5. The game was intense throughout the whole time and after the 5v5 we had to do the sprints again before we concluded.

We all went to the coaches’ office individually to discuss our status on the team. Unfortunately, for people like me, if you were not on the team to begin with or were not recently recruited, you got cut from the team.  

In a way it seems like they could have given at least one of the people who were trying out a chance to be on the team but I did not take this moment too personally and I just used this as a life lesson to work harder.

My advice for any incoming freshman who plans to try out for the team when you haven’t gotten recruited is to always put your best effort into it and everything happens for a reason.