Thursday, November 23 2000
Intelligencer
Journal http://www.lancasteronline.com/intell/sports.htm
Ian RadcliffIntelligencer Journal Correspondent
Real life can sometimes get lost in the cluttered schedule of a high school athlete.
Time becomes a blur, what with all the practices, the off-season workouts, the club teams and the open gyms.
And that doesn't even include the stress of mid-terms, finals, the car breaking down, college applications, proms, just to name a few things.
Now throw some of that real life into the mix. Some real life _ some issues teenagers really shouldn't have to deal with among all of that normal high school stuff.
Something like the death of a parent.
Hempfield senior Tracy Speelhoffer had a season that she and her teammates will never forget, and it has little to do with their Section One girls' volleyball title and third-place finish at states.
Speelhoffer's mother, Cynthia, died Sept. 22. It was cancer, and it had been slowly weakening her for the better part of two years.
"It was kind of unexpected," Tracy said. "We kind of knew it was coming, but we didn't know."
Cynthia's initial battle was successful _ there was a point when the cancer was completely contained. But more malignancies were found this spring.
"She had been getting worse," Tracy said, "but she was always there."
Even at the very end. Cynthia saw her daughter play on a Tuesday night for the last time, only two nights before checking into Essa Flory Hospice Center. Tracy was getting ready for school that Friday morning when she got the call that her mom had passed away. So here she was, just six matches into her senior season, her world completely changed. There was only one option for Tracy Speelhoffer, only one road for her to take.
"My mom got sick my sophomore year and right when I found out I thought about quitting," she said. "But my mom said, "Don't you dare,' because she didn't want me to miss anything.
"Having volleyball was my main outlet, and if I didn't have it, I don't know what I would have done. The whole team was there backing me up."
And there was no wavering when it came to their support, even though Cynthia's death came the day before the Warwick Tournament, a major in-season test for Hempfield.
Tracy played, and the team responded. The Knights handed Conestoga Valley one of only four losses the Buckskins suffered all season. They saw CV again in the final, and that time they came up short.
The following week a wake for Cynthia was held _ as much for the rest of the team as for Tracy.
"That next day we didn't practice," Hempfield coach Mike Vogel said. "The other girls were extremely upset. It was how she reacted. She was real composed, and it was OK.
"I would say she struggled on the offensive end, but she worked her way through it," he continued. "She never lost her starting job, not that she was expected to lose it."
The team took a cue from Tracy's peaceful demeanor and caught fire. After losing to CV in the L-L final, Hempfield didn't lose again until the District Three final, again to the Bucks.
"After a while, it was kind of like a weight had been lifted off," she said.
With an abundance of motivation pushing her back, and her shoulders free of emotional luggage, Tracy led her teammates on an improbable run through the state tournament.
First up was Athens and it was no contest _ 15-1, 15-2, 15-5. Then in the quarterfinals at Shippensburg, the Knights didn't lose a game against three traditional girls' volleyball powers _ Villa Maria, Baldwin and Greensburg Salem.
Gradually, the quiet outside hitter with a knack for the spectacular on defense had become the floor leader.
"As the season progressed, Tracy became more of an integral part," Vogel said. "She was finally saying, "Let's do something about this,' and she was loud in the huddle ... "Come on, let's get after them.' "
Only another meeting with the CV juggernaut in the state semifinals could put an end to Hempfield's season.
"I never would have thought we would have gotten this far," Tracy said after the last CV match. "It's tough, but we're just happy to be here. If we would have upset CV, that would have been cool, but we didn't expect anything. We went out and just played. There was no pressure on us. We were just glad to make it that far."
Hempfield lost to CV, 15-3, 15-3. For the season, the Knights' overall record was 27-4. They never lost to a team other than Conestoga Valley, which finished as the second-best team in the state. Today won't be the easiest day of Tracy Speelhoffer's life, but it certainly won't be the most difficult. She's already tackled that day head-on, and come out shining on the other side.
"My main motivation has always been to make her proud," she said. "After a good match, my dad would say that she would have been proud, and that's the biggest compliment I can get. He and I have stuck together."
And come next fall, Dad will send his youngest child off to college. Probably somewhere in Maryland, to study the environment in and around Chesapeake Bay.
As for volleyball, Tracy will probably play a bit for fun. Nothing real serious, she says.
Maybe it has something to do with the fact that her mom will never see her skid across the court to dig another ball that should never have been dug, or see her at the net with a huge block in her face, calmly putting the ball where nobody can get it.
But probably not.
Whether Tracy Speelhoffer has a chance to play competitively again is not important. She's already aced the biggest test of her life.