freshman lockout

All spring sports are now in action, and our Bulldogs are hard at work to improve and perfect their skills for their first meets, tournaments, competitions, and games. Within our athletic student body, there has been a lot of talk involving our Bulldog varsity locker room located in the athletic hallway. With so much involvement in our spring sports, being girls soccer, track, boys swim, girls golf, girls tennis, lacrosse, and boys baseball, the coaches decided that the varsity locker rooms were too full. Though this locker room is called the “varsity” locker room, all students participating in a sport would have access to the space in normal conditions. The coaches solution to this issue was to remove the freshman and place them in the normal athletic locker rooms. This change caused quite an imbroglio among the freshman athletes. 

Haley Ammons is a freshman tennis player, making the middle varsity team for her sport. “It's a little frustrating because I would like to put my stuff in there before practice so I don't have to rush or change in the car or anything. I’m in the athletic locker room but I haven’t actually put my stuff in there because the coaches often lock it to prevent people in P.E. classes from skipping, but the varsity locker room has a code that only the athletes know so they don’t have to lock it.” Ammons says. Other athletes agree with this “often locked” topic for the normal athletic locker room. Kate Fricke is a freshman basketball and soccer player, having made varsity for both sports. “I feel like it's not a good way to bond with the team, like during basketball season I was on JV for the first bit of the season, but being in the same locker room helped us all bond as a team I think which is super important for all sports. Having been in the varsity locker room we all know that it's a lot noticeably nicer than the normal athletic locker room. The other locker room is also always locked, which makes things difficult sometimes. I just would like to feel as though I always have access to my stuff.” Fricke states as well. 

Another aspect of this change that the athletes didn’t love was the fact that even if a freshman was to make varsity for their sport, and a sophomore were to make JV, they would still not have access to the varsity locker room. Hayleigh Wing is another varsity soccer freshman. She states “I think it’s unfair for the freshman who have worked hard to make varsity. I understand that they may not have enough room for everyone, but for me and the other freshman that made varsity soccer I think it’s unfair.” Even the athletes who are not on the varsity team for their sport agree that those who are should have access to the space. Hank DeFord is a freshman track member, and he says “I don’t really know our team placements yet, but I just think it's weird that if I were to make varsity I wouldn’t be in the varsity locker room, or any freshman honestly.” Some of the freshmen believe that there was another solution to the “lack of space” issue. “I feel like it would make more sense if the varsity teams were in the varsity locker room.” Ammons says.

 Others believe that the freshmen lockout makes sense, as getting older in your sport is a right of passage, and that it was the best possible solution. Ema Babnic is a sophomore track runner for Palisade. “I think they had to do something to change because there weren't enough lockers for everyone, and having done cross country and track I know how much sharing a locker with someone sucks. I think taking the freshman out was the best choice because it wouldn’t make sense to take out any other grade, and having the varsity locker room just be varsity wouldn’t be enough people in the varsity locker room, and it would be the opposite problem.” It's clear that this topic has spread a lot of debate throughout our athletes, we’ll see how it will play out through the rest of the spring season.