By Ryan Paglia
Shore Regional’s Ryan Paglia was able to close out his high school basketball career on the court but he was not able to compete this spring with the Blue Devils track and field team. Paglia will attend Clemson University this fall and shares his thoughts about how the coronavirus ended his senior year in high school.
On March 13 our principal went over the loudspeaker announcing that Shore Regional would be closing indefinitely. A majority of us thought that we would be out of school for two weeks and then everything would be back to normal. Little did we know that would be the end of our senior year, and along with it our spring sports season.
Ryan Paglia was able to compete in his senior season with the Shore Regional boys basketball team.
Although track wasn’t my main sport, I loved going down to the track every day to interact with my teammates and coaches. My teammates made me excited to go to practice every day and made me want to compete at my highest level. In particular, my shot put partner Sam Weber encouraged me every day to improve my abilities. Sam has a personal record of 55 feet, 8.25 inches and is committed to Lehigh University to continue his throwing career. Sam was prepared to break the school record for shot put and as a team, we would’ve broken the relay record.
Going into my third year of track, I was ready to compete. I was confident in myself after the few practices we did have. While I was still shaking off the rust from not throwing since the year prior, my throws felt more natural and overall better, and I was ready to improve on those skills. Unfortunately, I was never able to do this. Even though my fellow teammates and I will not be able to compete again, our coaches have remained in constant communication with us, in the form of zoom meetings where we would catch up and talk, as well as a senior dinner outside.
I think I’m speaking for every senior out there when I say that our senior year is not ending the way we expected it. We started looking forward to prom, field trips and graduation, and instead, we got Google meets with our teachers. However, even though this is not an ideal situation, whether it be school or athletics, we have been able to learn many life lessons through this historic time. I’ve learned things change very quickly and you have to learn to adapt quickly, and this relates to real life as well as sports. Up until now, I’ve only seen this on the court during basketball, but now I see that as a young adult we have to expect the unexpected and be prepared for anything.
The article originally appeared in the June 18-24, 2020 print edition of The Two River Times.
