In high school, sports are a big part of many teenagers’ lives. Playing a sport provides a healthy outlet and allows teens to bond with a team. To help bring individual and team success, several student-athletes have formed pre-game rituals or athletic superstitions.

When it comes to both baseball and softball, there’s one rule that all players make sure to follow on game day.

“Whenever there’s a game day, they paint the lanes, and you don’t walk on them because it’s bad luck,” junior shortstop Colten Wolfe said. “I never walk on the foul lines.”

As freshmen begin high school and some join a sport, they learn from older athletes, picking up on the upperclassmen’s habits. For the softball team, this gameday superstition is one they take seriously in passing down.

“We’ve already warned the freshmen to not step on the foul lines,” senior second baseman Mari Silva said. “That’s one of my biggest pet peeves. It drives me nuts. Before the game, you do not step on the lines.”

While avoiding the foul lines on the day of a game is specific to baseball and softball, listening to music is one habit that nearly all athletes include in their pre-game routine. Junior swimmer George Stenberg listens to “Mosh Pit” by Baby Keem before every meet. For senior tennis player Sophia Shelton, “Bejeweled” by Taylor Swift is a must to get ready for her match.

As far as the rest of the tennis team goes, superstitions aren’t something they heavily rely on.

“I’m not very superstitious,” senior tennis player Reid Nevins said. “I’m just angry; that’s how I win. If I had to think of something, it would be that when I miss, I always play the next point with the ball I missed with because I need to make it go in. I get angry at the ball.”

Similar to the tennis team, most members of the girls soccer team don’t have anything specific they do individually before every game. As a whole though, they’ve started something new this season, led by their head coach, Mr. Matthes.

“I personally don’t have any superstitions, but Matthes makes us do a Kumbaya before our game, and now we’re going to do it every game because it worked really well,” junior center middle Ellie Seracen said. “We sit in a circle and either sit in silence, talk, wrestle, or sing.”

The girl’s soccer team is lucky to have a method that calms them down before a game, but not everyone tries to manage their nerves. Senior track runner Vonn Borjas has developed a norm that is now unfortunately just a part of what makes him successful.

“I tend to get really nervous before any meet or time trial,” Borjas said. “After the event is done, most of the time I throw up because of the amount of adrenaline I get, but I feel better after like minutes.”

Just like food is the last thing on Borjas’ mind after he runs, most of the powerlifters avoid eating before their meet.

“Before a meet, I don’t eat anything the day of or the prior night,” senior powerlifter Shaden Soto said. “I’m trying to be the lightest in my weight class. If I’m the lightest in the weight class, and I lift as much as the heaviest girl, I’ll get first place because I weigh less than her, but I can lift more.”

In addition to not eating before a meet, senior powerlifter Elizabeth Dobbins takes an extra step to weigh the least she can.

“The night before, I always do this really long maintenance routine,” Dobbins said. “The gym that I go to has a personal red-light sauna in it, and that reduces inflammation and makes you sweat a lot, so basically, you just weigh a lot less. The less you weigh, the more competitive you can be sometimes.”

The powerlifting team’s habit of unique strategies is one thing that they share in common with the boys basketball team. A few players on the boy’s basketball team have an interesting way to hype each other up.

“Asher and I like to slap box before every game,” senior shooting guard Brayton Staedtler said. “You just slap each other in the face. It gets you going. It wakes you up.”

Similar to this hands-on approach, junior swimmer Jackson Johnson slaps the start block every time he anchors on a relay.

Whether the method is physical or mental, these athletes have developed rituals or superstitions to give their best performance. At the end of the day though, a Billie athlete’s hard work and dedication is what brings home the win.