Sports have certainly played an outsized role in my life since I was very young. In fact, I would say my journey as an athlete could be seen to accurately mirror my overall journey in life. The sport that I have stuck with since my youth and the sport that has had the most impact on my life has been soccer. I have had a bit of an up and down journey in the sport and have certainly had my fair share of struggles. I play goalkeeper which comes with some inherent physical and me

Fencing used to be something I did for fun. I remember the satisfaction of landing a clean touch, the way time would fly by when I was on the strip. But as time went on and I began competing more seriously, that joy slowly disappeared. The sport became a chore. Every Tuesday and Thursday, I dreaded the end of the school day because it meant three more hours of fencing—three hours of going through the motions, feeling like I was stuck. It took up so much of my time, yet I felt

My name is Myles, and I’m a student-athlete at Lick Wilmerding. I haven’t been a “sports guy” for most of my life. Sure, I played a few here and there—soccer in elementary school, tennis in middle school—but I never felt a deep connection or sense of identity through any of them. They were just things I did, not things I loved. That started to shift when I joined cross country during my freshman year. Over the next two years, I kept exploring, basketball, track but nothing re

For me, sports have always been more than just competition. They’ve been a way to relax, decompress, and escape. When I’m on the field, everything else fades. The noise in my head, the pressure of school, the complications of relationships, they all take a backseat. Soccer gives me one thing I struggle to find elsewhere: presence. When I’m playing, I’m not in my past mistakes or future anxieties. I’m just there. In moments where I’ve felt emotionally stuck or overwhelmed, soc