Fleming succeeds with full schedule
GC senior stays busy with school, sports, work
Olivia Fleming stays busy year round with academics, athletics, extracurriculars and work, and she really knows no other way.
The Gordon Central senior has a packed schedule and is short on free time, but that’s the way she likes it. She said she wouldn’t know what to do with herself if she wasn’t always on the go, checking off the next item on her daily calendar.
A big part of her four years at GC has been spent competing in athletics for various Warriors’ teams, including basketball, volleyball, soccer, track and field and cross country. This year as a senior, she has focused on three sports, volleyball, basketball and soccer, and she’s played a part of some memorable moments for each program.
This past Fall, Fleming competed on the volleyball court as the Lady Warriors played a varsity schedule for the first time in program history. She was a part of a group of seniors that helped start the program three years ago, learned the game and worked their way up after two years of JV competition. The Lady Warriors won their first-ever region match last season and also earned a win at the region tournament.
Fleming then turned to basketball and was a big part of a history-making season for the Lady Warriors as they got hot late in the season and earned their first-ever state tournament berth with a couple clutch wins over Dade County and Armuchee in the Region 7-AA Tournament. She did most of her work as a knockdown 3-point shooter for Gordon Central and helped lead the team as one of four seniors on the roster.
Fleming has now turned her attention to soccer this spring as she wants to be a part of the team turning things around under new head coach Matt Wiley. She competed as part of the Gordon Central track and field team the last few years in the spring.
Just like her days currently, Fleming also has her future planned out to a T. She has already enlisted in the Army and will head off to basic training soon after high school graduation in June and then spend several months at Advanced Individual Training. She has been accepted to the University of Illinois-Chicago where she plans to start next January while also being a part of the Army Reserve. She plans to major in Pre-Medicine and wants to follow her time at UIC by going to medical school at the University of California, Berkeley. Once all that is done, she wants to go into active duty in the Army and be a doctor in the field.
Recently, the Calhoun Times caught up with Fleming to discuss many subjects, including her goals and expectations for soccer this Spring, the special season she was a part of on the basketball court recently, helping establish the volleyball program at Gordon Central, her memories as an athlete at GC, the influence her coaches have had on her, what it is like juggling academics, athletics and everything else and what her future plans are, among other things. Here’s what she had to say:
CT:
Soccer season recently started. How has it gone so far and what are the goals and expectations for the team this Spring?
FLEMING:
Since we went to State with basketball, I didn’t get to play in some of the first few games with soccer which were non-region. But I kept up with the team and who was playing their hardest. So far we’ve been doing pretty well. Right now in our region, we’re 0-2, but just looking back on the past few years and comparing the team to now, it’s different.