Sports injury may be increasing among high school athletes, impacts Bergan too
Just as problems can be a part of life, injuries can be a huge part of sports. Some injuries take you out of a game or practice, but some might take away your entire season, even to affect your life forever after you play. Movie culture has recently moved into covering sports injuries with the movie Concussion, starring Will Smith. In this movie, Will Smith’s character, Dr. Bennet Omalu, discovers CTE, a brain trauma that is closely related to sports, particularly American football. One scary aspect of sports-related injuries that this movie presents is that many of these injuries athletes suffer from aren’t well researched at this point. Some athletes that used to play in the NFL are donating their bodies to science once they die so the research surrounding sports-related injuries can improve; hopefully, helping the lives of athletes in the future. Our high school sports teams at Archbishop Bergan Catholic School have experienced their fair share of injuries over the season so far, but are still working hard to finish each sport’s season strong. Bergan’s athletic trainer, Phil Lutz, is continuously working every day to ensure Bergan’s athletes are well protected from long lasting injury. In regards to the recent injuries Bergan has faced, Phil commented, “...injuries are kind of cyclical. We’ve had some injuries, but I don’t think there has been any rise in injuries [over the past couple of years]. The amount of injuries in football seems to be less, but in track, there are more.” Naturally, some seasons will bring more injuries than others, so it may just be the luck of the draw lately regarding injuries. Football is notorious for having plenty of physical contact between teams, and often quite a few injuries to accompany the physicality of the game. “It’s sometimes hard to stay healthy the whole season,” said Kolby Boggs. “The coaches tell us not to do anything stupid outside of playing football. I mean, if there’s already a big chance that you’ll get hurt playing football, why should you risk getting hurt outside of playing it too?” Even though Kolby’s statement holds a lot of truth, football players often have to deal with injuries left and right due to the nature of the contact-oriented game. Pictured above, Nick Burger- one of Bergan's finest athletes- was injured earlier in the season, suffering an ACL tear. Injuries like this are impossible to avoid, and can be difficult for teams to deal with fully. Replacing the leadership responsibility and the position itself is something that all sports teams have to do, and it has been something that Bergan's football team has unfortunately had to deal with. Injuries don’t just plague “contact sports,” such as football and basketball, but can also persist in sports such as cross-country. Senior Dylan Fuchs has had one such experience. Over Dylan’s career as a cross country runner, he has developed Iliotibial band syndrome, an injury that affects the knee and part of the thigh. Along with trying to improve his times continually, Dylan also must try to improve his form, so his case of band syndrome doesn't worsen. The most common types of injuries in cross country are bone-related injuries and overuse injuries, with one of such being Iliotibial band syndrome. Although precautions, such as stretching before and after sports activities, are taken to ensure injuries do not occur as often, this doesn’t always protect athletes from harm. Looking at another one of our fall sports, Tessa Kreikemeier is an amazing leader who participated in this year’s co-op softball team with Fremont. When asked how many injuries the team had, Tessa had to say, “Our varsity team really hasn’t experienced any big injuries outside of normal sore shoulders and all that, but our JV team got hit pretty hard with injuries this year. At one point, our JV team only had nine players who weren’t injured.” On defense, softball and baseball teams can only play nine players at a time. So that means the JV team barely had enough players to get through a full game, and one more player out would leave the team with fewer players than the amount they needed to play. However, they could take the field with one less player if needed. In practices, Tessa said that each player would usually stick to their position, but some players could step up and play almost any position on the field the coaches asked of them. With the end of the volleyball season drawing near, Senior Meghan Dahlhauser remarked, “We have been very lucky with injuries this season. Towards the beginning, we had some shin splints and strained quads, but we have punched back and are now healthier than ever. It's been a year since our setter, Allison Dieckmann (10th), sprained her ankle and was out for seven games, which was very hard for us to get through. This year, our coaches have made sure that we are extra careful during practice and make sure we are taking care of ourselves. Phil has been a huge help in the healing process of any tweaks we have here and there. We have been very blessed with no bad injuries.” In volleyball, players often have very specific roles on the team, somewhat like how a basketball team has its different positions and would use each player’s own individual strengths to the team’s benefit. When one of these prominent players might get injured, it may be difficult for the team to replace the positive impact provided by the injured player.
Taking this into mind, when we asked Meghan how the team tries to rebound from an injury and how the injury affects the team, she had to say, “We try not to let it affect us, but it does to some degree. We have to use a lot of strategies and have to change up a lot of stuff, so it does mess with our momentum. We are lucky not to have any injuries right now since we only have 12 girls, but every girl is always prepared to play any position if needed. Our strategical approach and our mental approach has shifted when we have injuries, so it is very important that we stay healthy and are extra careful, so we keep our momentum going.” As can be seen here from all of Bergan’s sports and how injuries affect them, it’s not hard to see how devastating injuries can be for high school teams. Luckily, new resources are being offered every day to support high school student-athletes and possible injuries they endure. With time, I expect high school sports to become much safer for students, while still maintaining their competitiveness and drive.
