In my last story “Help Prevent Sports Injuries”, I wrote about the amount of injured athletes at Alliance High School, how sports take over kids lives, and how the love of the game is greater than the fear of being hurt; what I didn’t write about was why athletes do what they do for sports that they love.

The game these athletes play is more than just some game to most. It is off-season conditioning, waking up early, and open gyms. After the countless hours of work in the off-season, you finally get to the season. Regardless of the long practices after school when you are tired, hungry, and sore, sports are about the fight that you put in before the game so you can get the best outcome when the game is over.

Sports are about being a part of something, from the coaches to the players to the managers and everything in-between. Everyone on a team gets a job, and every person on the team has a role. Whether it is being a player on the team, or being a part of the ‘behind the scenes’ aspect, everyone is important to the team.

When you’re on the bus with your headphones blaring, palms sweating, butterflies flying but all you can do is smile, that is one of the moments athletes live for. You can hear nothing outside the headphones, but what you see on that bus is incredible. You see a family. Some surroundings can differ depending on if it is girls or boys, but we are all on that bus to get the same result, a win. It’s when we pull up at the opponent’s town and the team piles out of the bus, catching their step, and lifting their heads.

Kids play sports because of the feeling you get when your team is lined up with their right hands over their hearts, swaying to the rhythm of the National Anthem. It is about the moment when the game is about to start and time stands still for just one second as you stand there and realize that all the pain and time you put in to this game is about to pay off. When your team steps out on the field after halftime, barely breathing, down by seven yet we fight until the time stops and we get the win. During a timeout, when you try to zone in on coach with the Dawg Pound and the crowd screaming in the distance.

I believe these are a few of the many moments that shape us into who we are as people. All the minor details in sports start to pile up, which in turn teaches athletes so many different lessons.