Column: Senior Moments, We're All in This Together

If you were to ask most people what their favorite sport to watch is, they might say football or basketball. Whether it be watching their favorite football team compete for the chance to play at the Superbowl, or cheering on their lead pick during March Madness, these kinds of sports take the world by storm.

This can be said about high school sports of Southeast Missouri, as well. The boys’ basketball team in my school is known for their skill and how often they go to the state championship. My team, though — the girls' team — is less well-known and does not have the same fan base.

Like many of the girls on my basketball team, I have played basketball since I was in third grade, starting out on a team at a local community center. I was not extremely fast or agile, but I was able to understand the basics of the game quickly. Over the years, I kept up with basketball, going to camps and eventually playing basketball all throughout my middle school and high school years.

Eventually, I reached the start of my senior year. I finished playing my final season of tennis, and now I am at the point where my final season of basketball is ahead of me. I had some debates at the beginning of the year about whether I wanted to play this year or not. I had a lot on my plate with applying to college and all, and basketball takes up four months of my life.

I had an intense war in my mind about whether I should play, until my coach and dad stepped in. My dad had been the one who had gotten me to play basketball in the first place and wanted me to finish out my high school career. My coach, Coach Thompson, said I needed to play and that quitting was not an option.

I had heard before that you should never quit, but my coach felt it was never an option. I explained about all of the struggles I had faced the year prior and how hard it would be to continue playing. He and my dad reminded me that even though I faced these hardships, I had gotten through them and become mentally stronger because of it.

I took this to heart when thinking about how this season would look. I knew from the years prior that we may not have a lot of seasoned players, but we do have a hardworking group of girls. We do not win a lot of games usually, but we never go down without a fight. A lot of the time, we have disagreements, but in the end, we come together for one common goal: to win.

As the start of the season has crept up on me, I have fully pondered these things and decided to take my last season head-on and not look back. This season will not be without its challenges, but that is what life is all about, anyway. Life has not been and never will be easy; you just must get stronger to get through each day. While this season may not be some epic scene straight out of the movie “High School Musical” with a full gym of screaming fans and planned dance choreography, it will be full of challenges that I will one day look back on, remembering how great it felt to be a part of a team that faced adversity and still came out on top.

Lilly Johnson is a senior at Charleston High School in Charleston, Mo. She has lived in Southeast Missouri most of her life and loves to travel with her youth group, jam to musicals and BTS, and paint during the late hours of the night.