Freshman take on their first high school soccer season

Emily Brey • September 22, 2015

Going into your freshman year of high school can be hard, even emotional at times. Transitioning within a team can be even more difficult when you’re surrounded by people that you have never met or played with before. After speaking to a few freshmen athletes, they gave an inside look into how they are dealing with this new change.

After speaking with Ryan Lazzarini, a freshman on Fossils soccer C-team, he stated that the transition was easier for him because he is involved in a sport. “The transition from middle school to high school has been easier than I thought it would be. I think that is probably because I’ve gotten to know new people and make friendships with them through being apart of one of Fossil’s soccer teams. I also feel more welcomed to this school because of those relationships that I’ve made.” Ryan feels more involved with Fossil, and his team is successfully performing due to their cohesiveness. He is looking forward to a great season playing on this team.

Tyler Ryfe, another player on the C-team, talked about the most enjoyable and least enjoyable things about playing on a Fossil soccer team. “One of the biggest advantages of playing on a high school team is that I get to play a new position and play with all my friends. The least enjoyable part of high school soccer is the inconsistency of competition.” He talked further in detail about the fact that the teams that they play are either a skilled, solid group or they are clearly not at the level that they should be at if they want to play competitive games. He has been playing well helping his team get their wins. He loves the team, and he loves his coach; Tyler is ready to sweep out a strong record this year.

JV squad member, Gavin Johnson , speaks about the environment of being a part of a high school sports team. “The environment has been different for me because I am representing a whole school, rather than just myself.” He likes being under the pressure of needing to perform well, and has a lot of support from fellow students, friends, and family members. “Knowing other players on teams from other schools makes victory much more satisfying, and creates a respected image for fossil players around Fort Collins.”

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The freshmen overall love playing for Fossils teams, and are looking forward to playing out the season solidly.

(Photo Credit: Kaitlynn Schmurr) — Photo provided by Kaitlynn Schmurr

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About the Contributor

Emily Brey, Sports Editor

Emily Brey is a senior at Fossil Ridge High School who is in her third year on the Etched In Stone staff and is Co-Editor of the Sports BEAT. Emily plays varsity soccer for Fossil and also plays for Arsenal Colorado on the ‘00 Academy team. She is committed to play soccer at Colorado State University - Pueblo and plans to study business and law in college. After attending CSUP, she hopes to attend CU where she will go for her MBA.

Between taking on a full schedule and all of her extracurricular commitments, Emily is a very busy bee this year. Emily is serving as Vice President of FBLA here at Fossil, and is a member of Key Club and NTHS (National Technical Honor Society). She is an ambitious young lady whose reliability, organization, and work ethic has helped her achieve many goals in her time thus far at Fossil Ridge. She is a huge fan of Lana Del Rey and the bands, All Time Low, SWMRS, Waterparks, and The Wrecks. She enjoys spending time outside and organizing things, which relaxes her. When she isn’t covering a story or playing soccer, Emily enjoys being a homebody and watching movies.

The friendly, family-like environment that the journalism program at Fossil encompasses has been something she has valued since freshman year. She would love to be able to continue journalistic work after high school. Emily looks forward to leading the Journalism 1 writers, no matter if that’s in journalism or just life in general. Plus, she hopes to inspire the younger writers to report on other topics besides sports, just because that’s something that she wishes she would’ve done the past two years. Her main goal for the year in journalism is to get better with her coverage, especially with using multiple media platforms. Emily wants to try and expand from her comfort zone of sports writing, hoping to experience writing different journalistic topics.