With the arrival of the new trimester, spring sports are in full swing. Tryouts for varsity and junior varsity are a part of all programs.
For the Spring Lake Girls Tennis program, tryouts looked different this year. Any girls who were interested in trying out for varsity were required to commute to MVP Athletic Club in Holland at 5 a.m. before school started.
Spring Lake High School MVP is a 38-45 minute drive or more depending on traffic. This meant that many of the girls were not going to arrive at school on time for Spring Lake’s 7:40 start time.
Casey Ferguson, a sophomore, reflected on her experience, “I was only ever a few minutes late to school but I know other girls that were much later. My parents had to drive me and they just sat in the parking lot until I was done”.
Logistics and travel are always a part of sports, but usually in the afternoon.
“For the morning tryouts, I was waking up at four in the morning and having to drive to Holland,” senior Sloan Horton said. “In my opinion, it honestly wasn’t too bad waking up that early, but later in the week I could definitely feel the lack of sleep catching up to me and felt a lot more tired than I normally did which at times made it harder to focus.”
Although the morning tryouts have been different this year most of the girls expressed excitement for new coach Katelyn Schaffer, along with JV coach Allison Deyoung.
