NINA’S KICKING GOALS
Cat a star with the ball and the books
SHE may be known as a star for the Geelong Cats on the footy field, but Nina Morrison also shines academically.
The AFLW Rising Star nominee achieved a stellar ATAR while juggling sport with her VCE studies last year.
Morrison was studying at Geelong Grammar and training with the Falcons and then the Cats VFLW side while living with her family in Williamstown in Melbourne’s western suburbs.
And despite juggling sport, study and the travel, she managed to top the prestigious school’s VCE cohort last year with an impressive score of 99.75.
The No.1 draft pick said she used footy as an escape from study and study as an escape from football.
“I knew there was limited time for each, so it meant the time I did have, I was forced to use really efficiently,” Morrison said.
“You often find that sometimes if you can’t work, and then you do exercise it’s easier to sit down.”
“There wasn’t heaps of time for other stuff but I felt like I was getting enough leisure time, because I was enjoying football so much that it was enough of a social escape given the team nature of the sport.”
Morrison said she found that ensuring study time was spent working efficiently was most beneficial in her studies.
She said a lot of people got caught in a trap of setting aside blocks of study time, but became distracted and didn’t spend it effectively.
The 18-year-old, who lives with friends in Geelong West, studies exercise and sports science at Deakin University.
She didn’t need a score as high as she achieved to enter the course, but was motivated to see what she could achieve.
“I didn’t have a specific goal ATAR but knew if I put in the work I could potentially do really well,” she said.
“I was hoping to get pretty high so I was pretty proud.”
Morrison, whose debut season started brilliantly before being cruelled by an ACL injury at training, is looking forward to getting back into playing AFLW next season.
She reminded VCE students there are other paths to get where they want to go if they don’t achieve the necessary ATAR. “I guess it’s a funny one because, in the end, the mark you get dictates whether you get into the course to begin with, but in the end doesn’t end up being that important,” Morrison said.