Becoming a Team: a Timpview athlete story (by Finneas Jackson)

The summer before my junior year, I was looking forward to being on the varsity lacrosse team. I had worked hard to improve, and being a junior at the time also helped my chances. However, there were 16 seniors also trying to make the team. Once the teams were announced, I noticed that my name had not been called. I asked my coach about it, and he explained to me that he “needed me to be a leader on JV.” Though this didn’t seem so bad, it bothered me, and I felt somewhat like a failure. I was very discouraged to be playing on the junior varsity team. Many members of the team were much younger and much less experienced than I was. What’s worse is that I felt that I couldn’t improve because of my teammates. When we arrived at our first big game against Alta, we were extremely unprepared and unmotivated—we lost 1-7. However, this defeat helped me realize that I needed to change my attitude and stop worrying about myself. I began to build positive relationships with my teammates; I focused on encouraging and lifting them. Soon enough, I found myself improving and feeling much better about myself and my team. We started having more productive practices with field time. We started pushing each other to our limits in the weight room. And eventually, we started winning a few games. I saw what my simple change had done and decided to capitalize on it. I began leading more directly and compassionately, our team began to build stronger bonds, and we quickly became a family. When the time came to play Alta again, we were still nervous, but we had worked hard together, and I knew we were far more prepared and motivated this time around. Our second match with Alta was a vigorous battle neck and neck the entire time. But this time, we came out on top, leaving them—and frankly ourselves—stunned at the final score: 13-11.