{"id":44592,"date":"2024-10-16T07:14:58","date_gmt":"2024-10-16T11:14:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/?p=44592"},"modified":"2024-10-16T07:55:32","modified_gmt":"2024-10-16T11:55:32","slug":"wieloch-is-proving-girls-can-ball-too","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/sports\/2024\/10\/16\/wieloch-is-proving-girls-can-ball-too\/","title":{"rendered":"Wieloch is proving girls can ball too"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Many young athletes have one dream in mind. Make it to a US National Team and compete at the Olympics. With the crowd roaring and the adrenaline pumping, the feeling is unmatched. Unfortunately, only 1 in every 500,000 youth athletes get to experience this. At 16, North Penn Sophomore, Tessa Wieloch has defied these odds accomplishing the first goal, and is well on her way to the next.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Being a 2-time US U-17 Flag Football National Team player, Wieloch is no stranger to competition, but flag football wasn\u2019t her first love.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWhen I was 5 my parents bought me skates for Christmas, so I went with it. I [figure skated] for 6 years when a girl recommended I try REC for flag football. I had enjoyed playing at recess, but I never thought I would get this into it. [Before this] I had never done a team sport,\u201d Tessa Wieloch stated. \u201cI didn\u2019t start flag football until 6th grade.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Although she started older than others, she quickly made an impact on the field.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI started with REC and my coach wanted me to try the tournament [team],\u201d Wieloch explained. \u201c[That] first year we went up to Boston and we qualified for nationals and that\u2019s where it took route.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">From there, she continued to excel, getting recognized by scouts and eventually making it to the national stage.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c[I played] on the U-17 National Team in both 2023 and 2024. We had two tryouts: National Team Trials where you do a lot of testing, like the 40-yard dash and the second was more mental practice, like offense and defense [specific drills]. Through those two practices, they went from 36 to 18, then down to 12 who got to play. I was one of them.,\u201d Wieloch stated.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThe first year, we played in Charlotte, North Carolina the second we played in San Diego, California both times against six teams,\u201d Wieloch continued.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While she accomplished one of her goals by playing for the National Team, Tessa has her mind set on even bigger goals.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI have goals for the future. I really want to go to the Olympics because [flag football] just became an Olympic sport for 2028. So if I could do that it would be amazing,\u201d Wieloch explained. \u201cThe thought of that is pushing me.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">From a young age, Tessa has had her mind set on these goals, but not quite in this manner.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<aside>\n    <div class='pullquote sno-pullquote-6a605241667da sno-animate pullquote-shadow'>\n                <div class=\"quotebody\">\n                        <div class='largequote'>&ldquo;<\/div>\n                                    <p class='pullquotetext'>When I was younger, [teachers] would pass out the \u201cwhat do you want to do when you grow up\u201d papers and I used to write I wanna go to the Olympics<\/p>\n                            <p class='quotespeaker'>&mdash; Tessa Wieloch, NPHS Student <\/p>\n                        <div class=\"clear\"><\/div>\n        <\/div>\n    <\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<style>\n.sno-pullquote-6a605241667da {\n    display: flex;\n    float: left;\n    margin: 30px 30px 30px 0;\n    width: 50%;\n    border-color: #06072b;\n    border-top-width: 8px;\n    border-right-width: 8px;\n    border-bottom-width: 8px;\n    border-left-width: 8px;\n    background-color: #bedbf4;\n}\n.sno-pullquote-6a605241667da p.pullquotetext,\n.sno-pullquote-6a605241667da p.quotespeaker {\n    color: #000000 !important;\n}\n.sno-pullquote-6a605241667da .pullquotepic {\n    width: 33%;\n    margin-left: 25px;\n}\n.sno-story-body .sno-pullquote-6a605241667da p.pullquotetext {\n    font-size: 22px;\n    line-height: 1.4em;\n}\n.sno-pullquote-6a605241667da .quotebar {\n    background: #dddddd;\n    flex: 0 0 90px;\n    margin-top: -15px;\n    margin-left: -15px;\n    padding-left: 15px;\n    padding-top: 15px;\n    margin-right: 15px;\n}\n.sno-pullquote-6a605241667da .largequote {\n\tcolor: #888888;\n}\n.sno-pullquote-6a605241667da .quotebody {\n    width: unset;\n}\n<\/style>\n\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWhen I was younger, [teachers] would pass out the \u201cwhat do you want to do when you grow up\u201d papers and I used to write I wanna go to the Olympics,\u201d Wieloch explained. \u201c I was planning for figure skating, but now that I\u2019m almost 16 and I am starting to think about my future, I think that\u2019s a possibility for [flag football] instead.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Olympics aren\u2019t her only goal, however. Tessa also hopes to leave a lasting impression on those who follow in her footsteps.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWhile the Olympics is a really big deal to me, I want people to look up to me. I want to be Carly Lloyd for some people that they look up to and be like Wow I want to be like her, I want to train like her, I want to have the motivation like her. I want to be that for women and girls especially in a male-dominated sport, like football.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">These goals don\u2019t just get accomplished overnight, but instead through countless hours of work behind the scenes.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c[My motto is] to do one thing every day that makes you better,\u201d Wieloch stated. \u201cProgress is never going to be completely linear. It\u2019s not just going to keep going up and up, you\u2019ll have bad and good days. But if you do one thing every day, you\u2019ll never go backward. My dad and I try to do it [together]. Whether we do core workouts, 100 catches, or Physical Therapy, he really motivates me to get going.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cIt\u2019s the things you do alone that are harder to do, but my goals keep me going,\u201d Wieloch continued.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While most of the improvements occur when she\u2019s alone, Wieiloch attributes a lot of her success to those around her.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c[I] attribute my success to my coaches and other players,\u201d Wieloch explained. \u201cPlaying on a tournament team, the people there really push me to want to be better and do better for them. When I see their successes or them doing well and their goals, I want to help them get to where they\u2019re going as they\u2019ve helped me get to where I\u2019m going. I have had a great experience with my teammates and coaches and I really think they made me love the game as much as I do.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As Tessa says, progress is not always linear, but she has figured out a way to overcome the obstacles presented before her.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThere definitely are obstacles,\u201d Wieloch stated. \u201cMostly people saying you can\u2019t do this or you\u2019re too short, which yes I am 5\u20194, but there are always going to be people that try to hold me back and I have just have to push through.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Many young athletes have one dream in mind. Make it to a US National Team and compete at the Olympics. With the crowd roaring and the adrenaline pumping, the feeling is unmatched. Unfortunately, only 1 in every 500,000 youth athletes get to experience this. At 16, North Penn Sophomore, Tessa Wieloch has defied these odds&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":44593,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,11],"tags":[],"staff_name":[1341],"class_list":["post-44592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","category-top-stories","staff_name-maddie-cimino"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44592","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44592"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44592\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44595,"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44592\/revisions\/44595"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44592"},{"taxonomy":"staff_name","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.knightcrier.org\/app-json\/wp\/v2\/staff_name?post=44592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}