Freshman On Varsity Quotes

Pete Berman sized up his competition like a predator lining up its prey. Gerry Williams dribbled once with his left hand, stopped on a dime, and nailed an open 15-footer. He had played on the Fellingwood Varsity Basketball Team since his freshman year, and was now a 16 year-old boy in a man's body. Pete sat on a board of the old splinter-ridden, wooden stands fixed on Gerry, but he was unable to defend his turf. His team was losing badly again, and the waiting was pure agony.

conversation that included the news that the Bruins had just lost the freshman coach. Wooden offered Cunningham the job before the end of the meal. A high school junior varsity coach in Ohio tried to land what had suddenly become an unusually attractive role, in the program coming off back-to-back national championships, on the team

If I were to ask you about let’s say coaching a high school football team for your local high school and told you the only time you were needed to be there as coach, was on game day. That is right no practice during the week, just take the team and win is all we ask. How do I prepare them if I cannot practice you ask? Well sir they have been trained and practiced in their freshman, sophomore and junior years. You will be the varsity coach and the team knows the game and how it’s played, all you need to do is set up the game plan on game day and organize your team so they win! Ludicrous! How can I be expected to develop the cohesion necessary to put a winning team on the field, without practice, despite their prior training and the three-plus years’ experience? Yes it is ludicrous. Yet this is exactly what we expect of law enforcement, security personnel and other first responders tasked with responding to and winning in crisis situations.

As we walk through downtown Charming toward the diner, I shove my hands into the pockets of my hoodie and study Rider out of my peripheral vision. He’s carrying Poppy in a front-facing body sling. She’s clapping and kicking and utterly excited to be on this outing. The two of them are quite a sight, and everyone we pass, women especially, takes their time perusing this sexy male specimen. I turn away, chiding myself for wanting to look. Technically, I should be able to stare at Rider unabashedly, especially after our conversation this morning and what we did to each other last night, but I’m a little leery of letting on exactly how much I like him. He can reassure me with words, but I still consider him a flight risk. Maybe less than he was freshman year, but I need more time to see if he means what he says. Being with Rider is like circling the sun, wondering how close I can get before I get burned.

So do beautiful women dating pieces of shit like Cal Winston. I pinch the bridge of my nose, irritated I have to play another year of football with that asshole. Don’t get me wrong—I’m not mad at Sienna. How could I ever be mad at her? She’s like a damn sunflower, all cheery and gorgeous and perfect. I vaguely remember her from freshman year, but until she moved in with my sister, we never ran in the same circle of friends. In retrospect, I’m a dumbass for not making a point to get to know her because she’s fucking spectacular. She has thick, dark hair and light brown eyes. An off-the-charts smile. A tight little body. A great personality. Literally the stuff of my fantasies. It took everything in me not to tell her Winston was likely planning to fuck a horde of women the second she steps on an airplane tonight.

Gabs, can we talk a second?” He clears his throat. Nothing good ever follows that statement. I brace myself for what’s sure to be an awkward conversation. “I just want to apologize for our… misunderstanding freshman year.” I’m silent for a moment, but the rush of anger that spikes my pulse has me responding before I think better of it. “You’d call it a misunderstanding, huh?” I roll my eyes. “Funny, I didn’t think I misunderstood anything, but if you want to mansplain it to me now, go for it.” Why make this easy for him? It’s always been difficult for me to make friends, but for some reason, Rider slipped through my defenses. I was assigned to tutor him in English. I remember meeting him in the library, and the shy smile he gave me. He was embarrassed to need help. It was the most endearing thing I’d ever seen, and I swear when he leveled me with those big gray eyes, the ground fell out beneath me. I’m a practical girl, but foster care made me cynical, and ending up with my aunt did nothing to help my outlook on life. But Rider was funny and sweet, not to mention ridiculously good-looking, and I went over faster than a felled log in a forest. This was before he was the golden boy of the football team. When he was just this guy Rider from some speck-of-dust small Texas town like me. Even though he rode the bench, I went to all of his games, and we’d grab pizza afterward and talk until late in the night. Although he didn’t outright say it, I knew he had a rough home life. He mentioned that his father was an ass. I wanted to wrap my arms around him and make it better. And I thought I meant something to him. That what we had was special. Until he became the starting quarterback.

Tough cojones, brother. Listen, by any chance are you Michael Oliver, the running back on the team? You go by the nickname Olly?” I close my eyes and tilt my head back. Great. Just what I need now. For my dirty laundry to be aired out across town. “Who wants to know?” “Just a fan. I’m Samuel, by the way. I think we had bio together freshman year.” “Hey, man. How’s it going?” It takes every ounce of energy in my body to be friendly. “By the sound of it, better than you. Hey, we’re having a little shindig over here tonight. Wanna come over and toss back some beer?” Fuck it. “Yeah. Sure. Think you might want to help me figure out how to win back a girl who probably hates my guts by now?” A deep chuckle rumbles out of the phone. “I’m a plotting master. Get your ass over here, and we’ll figure it out.” 18 MAGGIE

At least Asher is mine—the DNA test confirmed it. Sometimes I’m tempted to pick up the phone and call Charlotte to vent before I remember she doesn’t give a shit. That’s a whole different level of betrayal. I don’t even know where the fuck she went. Dakota and her mother Waverly won’t tell me anything, and Charlotte changed her number, so it’s not like I can ask her. And even though she took pics for her sister’s social media, Charlie never posted any of her own online. After being on that reality show as a kid, she hated being in the spotlight. Charlotte was my best friend from high school, the girl who never asked for tickets to games or wanted my help getting into hot parties or grilled me about my college prospects. I had a little thing for her when we first met. With her light blonde hair, big blue eyes, petite frame, and quiet ways, she drew out all of my protective instincts. She was in my English class freshman year, and one day our teacher randomly picked her to be Juliet. Charlie had to lie there while I, Romeo, reacted to her death. Even though we’d never spoken at that point, I could tell she was terrified. I hooked her pinky finger with mine to help steady her, and from that point on, we became the best of friends. So when guys were dicks to her, I made it clear they’d have to go through me if they ever thought to mess with her. When I saw her sitting alone in the cafeteria, I pulled up the seat next to her. When she seemed sad, I invited her to hang out. But she never looked at me all googly-eyed like the other girls. She never flirted or found reasons to touch me. She actually made me do my homework when we studied together. I figured she wasn’t into me like that and moved on. But she was still my best friend. Even when things got awkward between us after I started dating Dakota.

From kindergarten through senior year of high school, Evan attended Crossroads, an elite, coed private school in Santa Monica known for its progressive attitudes. Tuition at Crossroads runs north of $ 22,000 a year, and seemingly rises annually. Students address teachers by their first names, and classrooms are named after important historical figures, like Albert Einstein and George Mead, rather than numbered. The school devotes as significant a chunk of time to math and history as to Human Development, a curriculum meant to teach students maturity, tolerance, and confidence. Crossroads emphasizes creativity, personal communication, well-being, mental health, and the liberal arts. The school focuses on the arts much more than athletics; some of the school’s varsity games have fewer than a dozen spectators. 2 In 2005, when Evan was a high school freshman, Vanity Fair ran an exhaustive feature about the school titled “School for Cool.” 3 The school, named for Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken,” unsurprisingly attracts a large contingent of Hollywood types, counting among its alumni Emily and Zooey Deschanel, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jack Black, Kate Hudson, Jonah Hill, Michael Bay, Maya Rudolph, and Spencer Pratt. And that’s just the alumni—the parents of students fill out another page or two of who’s who A-listers. Actor Denzel Washington once served as the assistant eighth grade basketball coach, screenwriter Robert Towne spoke in a film class, and cellist Yo-Yo Ma talked shop with the school’s chamber orchestra.