Meet Alyssa Diggs
7/19/2010 12:00:00 AM | Soccer
July 19, 2010
Here's the scoop on the first week at Mizzou from Freshman Alyssa Diggs, who comes to Missouri from Coppell, Texas:
My first week at Mizzou was kind of chaotic but at the same time I was really excited to finally get here. A couple of days before I came, I got my wisdom teeth pulled out at the last minute. I was hoping that the swelling would be gone by the time I got to Mizzou, but of course, there was no such luck. I pulled up to the dorms looking like I had two golf balls stuffed into my cheeks. I was a little embarrassed to meet my coaches, teammates and people from the dorms with my cheeks so swollen but, thankfully, a couple days later they went back to normal.
When I checked into the dorm, I was expecting to be sharing a room, but I ended up having my own room. I got extremely homesick as soon as my family left to go back home, but I was glad to have the other freshmen soccer players with me to make me feel better. I think we've gotten pretty close already. We all had a lot of fun meeting and hanging out with the other athletes that live in our dorm. We had a couple days to get settled in before classes started so we took advantage of the time we had off to hang out with our new friends.
Our first day of classes was actually pretty fun. We were all fortunate enough to be in all the same classes. The first class started at 9:50a.m. (I was so glad that we didn't have to go to class at 7a.m.!) Our second class is at 1 and then we have study hall right after class. After study hall is over we go straight to practice. By the end of the day, I am extremely tired from running from place to place and then going to practice right after.
Right now, the practices are run by the captains. We usually warm up and then the girls will scrimmage or play 3v3. Unfortunately before I came to Mizzou I strained my hamstring so I haven't been able to play with the girls just yet. I've been going to rehab everyday with the team's trainer, Tara McClelland, and I am definitely making progress. The girls' style of play is a little faster and more aggressive than my club teams so hopefully I'll be able to keep up when I can finally play again. Although I can't do contact at the moment, I've been able to do all the fitness with the girls. It's been pretty challenging trying to get back in shape, but the older girls are great at encouraging all the newcomers. Twice a week we lift weights. I was kind of nervous the first time we worked on in the weight room because I've never lifted as much weight as the upperclassmen were lifting. The weight room workout was a little difficult but I think most of the freshmen are looking forward to getting bigger and stronger like the other girls.
During the week, Bryan {Blitz} invited all the freshmen and a new senior, Paula Pritzen, over to his house for dinner. The food was delicious and everyone was grateful to have a break from the dorm food. We met Todd Schulenberger's beautiful newborn baby girl, and we gave his wife a Mizzou onesie and a bottle for the baby. After dinner, we played Wii dance. I have to say that Ryan Huber, the team's multimedia director, was probably the best dancer out of everyone. His dance moves were superior. After dinner, we went back to the dorms to finish our project.
This weekend we finally got some time to really hang out with our new teammates. We drove down to Lake of the Ozarks to hang out at a lake house and have some much needed bonding time. When we came back to the dorms we had a very serious dance party (strobe lights included). It was really nice to get out of the dorms and just spend some time with the team. I'm really excited to be here and can't wait for season to start!
