Dealing with frustration of not playing
This type of freshman college experience not what she expected
Women’s basketball at Chico State is among one of the sports that had to shut down its season because of COVID-19. Since elementary school, I have been waiting, hoping, dreaming, for my opportunity to play basketball in college.
Only for me to not get that
chance.
Since COVID hit, one thing after another started falling apart in my life. First, it was my senior year of high school. No graduation, no grad night, no fun senior activities that you get to do for the last half of your senior year. And then it was college.
Chico State was among the first to officially shut down on-campus activities during the fall.
And then we had a total shutdown. Everything I needed to help me stay connected with basketball had closed down. I started to feel overwhelmed and frustrated. I hated the fact that I wasn’t playing basketball. I hated it because this is what I am made for … I am an athlete. I don’t choose to sit around all day. I need to be out and to be active.
I initially started to feel worthless. As a lot of other athletes across the country did. I had no motivation and I just wanted to be left alone.
In an article written by the American Psychological Association, it states, “The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) polled more than 37,000 student-athletes in the early weeks of the pandemic and discovered that they had high levels of stress and depression, caused mostly by the disruption and uncertainty in their lives. Stressors included fear of exposure to COVID-19 (43 percent), lack of motivation (40 percent), feelings of stress or anxiety (21 percent), and sadness or depression (13 percent). About 80 percent said they were having a hard time keeping up their athletic training, in part because they didn’t have access to an appropriate facility.”
And then the worst thing yet happened. They officially canceled our basketball season. Chico State and our CCAA league were the first to cancel all fall, winter and spring sports.
After hearing this news, my emotions completely went everywhere. I felt so detached and angry and there was nothing that I could do about it.
Not only was our season being canceled, but even more frustrating was when we found out that almost every other league in California was still having a season. Many are playing as you are reading this right now.
Our head coach, Brian Fogel, is always reminding us that these other leagues playing are going to close down soon, too. Fogel said, “Girls we have to remember that this isn’t going to last forever. We are going to get over this pandemic and we are going to play again. These other teams are soon going to realize that they can’t play in the standards that the NCAA has laid out.” But it sure doesn’t feel like they are going to stop playing any time soon. And it is a slap in the face to see all of these other schools competing when we aren’t even allowed to practice with each other.
It is very hard for me to keep a smile on my face and root for all my friends that are currently competing in their sport. I feel that it is so unfair and it is killing me inside that I don’t get to have the same experience. Even then, I know that this virus is a real thing and Chico is just trying to protect us and do the best that they can do. And in the meantime, I can keep working and pushing myself in my own workouts that I do daily to keep me in basketball shape, and to keep doing the thing I love.
At least I have still been able to connect and be with my teammates. Getting to bond with them is so important and I am grateful that I still get to do that with them.
I just wish, with all my heart, that I could be in Acker gym, getting the freshman experience that I am wholeheartedly missing out on.