College Essay (Melrose High School Student, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Isenberg School of Business)
I am the proud founder of the Candy Cup Street Hockey Tournament, a league for 10-12 year olds. Throughout the summer of my pre-teen years, participants competed to bring home the prized possession, a plastic trophy filled with candy. You might think that this sounds like just a silly activity that a bunch of middle schoolers made up, but I take a lot of pride in it. The league was created by kids and played by kids, with no adult involvement. In early June, I held a draft in my backyard. I named captains and tried to even out the skill level. Once teams were established, I made a schedule, wrote post game recaps, and managed the league of thirty or so kids, ensuring that everyone showed up on time and got substitutes when necessary.
When there were fights, parents weren’t there to break them up, so we figured it out. If we disagreed, we were forced to compromise. If a team was stacked, we would have to learn to live with the fact that life isn’t always fair. There weren’t many problems, though. Games were more often broken up by laughter than by anger and when we teased each other, it was mostly for fun. We all simply loved playing sports and would do anything for the joy of playing.
The league fell apart when we all entered ninth grade and although I only played a few seasons of high school hockey, the foundation I built in the Candy Cup guided my high school sports experience.
I worked really hard to make teams and win specific positions, and I am proud of my achievements, but it is the camaraderie that has made the memories that will last a lifetime. The best coaches and assistant coaches seem to know this. Yes, they work us hard and expect each team member to keep working for a spot. Yes, they want to win and will do pretty much whatever is necessary to make sure that happens. But those coaches I have the greatest memories of have done other things, too: crazy dances after winning games, inspirational text messages quoting television shows. They check in off-season to be sure everything is going well and they encourage all of us to play other sports and keep our grades up. They care for the athletes on the team, like we cared for each other in the old street hockey league.
The big break from high school athletics that has been necessary because of the pandemic has made me realize that it isn’t just winning the games or working hard to get a spot on the team, it isn’t going to the Super Bowl or hoisting a trophy that is most important to me. It is falling down laughing in the locker room. It is inside jokes. It is teammates who will do anything for me and who I will do anything for. It is the love of the game, all of the game, that matters most to me.
And, more than anything, that is why I will always be proud of the Candy Cup.
A bunch of pre-teens, running around, hitting each other with sticks, laughing, crying, fighting, quitting and figuring it out together. None of our parents were yelling at us to do better from the sidelines. We didn’t worry about college offers. We were just playing around. Kid-run, kid-played, kid-organized fun. I imagine one day running into an old teammate. After we talk about all of the winning we did in high school, all of the fine accomplishments we are so proud of, we’ll look at each other and say, “Yeah, but how about the Candy Cup?”
And then we’ll laugh about when we were kids, simply having so much fun.