After 45 minutes, junior Nick Joslyn exits his car to practice the sport he loves.
“We practice at Soccer KEMistry in Olathe, KS,” Joslyn said.
The drive to Olathe is better then last year, when Joslyn traveled across the state line to Missouri to practice.
“I play for KCSC (Kansas City Soccer Club) Blackstars 96/97, from Overland Park, KS,” Joslyn said.
The drive is worth it to Joslyn because playing on these teams are necessary to play college soccer.
“College coaches look at the club team rather than the high school team in soccer,” Joslyn said.
Joslyn even travels out of state, sometimes hundreds of miles to play in front of coaches at college showcases. Recently this year, Joslyn’s team got accepted into USYSA National League, which takes them across America to play some of the best teams in the nation.
“We have been to (Las) Vegas, North Carolina, Ohio, Arkansas and St. Louis,” Joslyn said.
Its nothing new for Joslyn, who has been playing soccer in Kansas City for four years. The numerous teams draw in players from not only the Kansas City metropolitan area, but rural areas in both Kansas and Missouri. On the Kansas side, Baldwin, DeSoto, Tonganoxie, Louisburg, Basehor-Linnwood, Lawrence and Lawrence-Free State are all area schools that have soccer players traveling to Kansas City to play against the best competition in Kansas. Currently, BHS has eight players from the boys varsity soccer team that plays in the Kansas City area.
“We have players from Lee’s Summit, Kansas City, Overland Park, and Olathe,” Joslyn said.
Senior Mason Bandré, junior Duncan Murray, and sophomore Joel Dixon all play in Overland Park for the gigantic Sporting Blue Valley. The club has as many as eight teams in each age group. The club has the right to practice on the world-class facility Overland Park Soccer Complex, which hosts tournaments 12 months a year. But even world-class facilities doesn’t stop the club from going to various tournaments around the Midwest.
“We’ve been to South Dakota, North Dakota, Iowa, Arkansas, St. Louis and Oklahoma,” Bandré said.
Dixon and Bandré both play in leagues that force them to travel to games around the Midwest.
“This year we’re going to Michigan for National Premier League, St. Louis, and Nebraska,” Dixon said.
Sophomore Sierra McKinney is the only player from the girls soccer team to play in Kansas City, which means she goes to showcases and tournaments all over the region as well.
“I play for KC United from Kansas City,” McKinney said. “We’ve gone to Oklahoma, Michigan and Wisconsin.”
McKinney held the same values as the boys when it came to playing club soccer
“It gives you life lessons and it also helps with college,” McKinney said.
Soccer is not the only sport that BHS athletes travel to great lengths to play. This includes freshman Jake and Joel Katzer and senior Jessie Katzer playing hockey, sophomore Jordan Hoffman, volleyball and junior Cornell Brown, basketball. But none could compare to the overwhelming amount of players playing softball. Senior Kaitlin Jorgensen and Hailey Cope travel to Lawrence, KS to play softball with players from Lawrence, Olathe and Manhattan.
“We play for the Lawrence Thunder,” Cope said. “We’ve gone to places like Colorado and Arkansas.”
Softball is yet another sport where teams are traveling hundreds of miles to play in front of college coaches. But to Jorgensen and Cope, the travel is rewarding.
“There are recruiting tournaments,” Jorgensen said. “I think it is totally worth it.”
But BHS softball veterans like Cope and Jorgensen are not the only ones who play club ball, BHS has two incoming freshman who have had travel team experience.
“I play for Sidekicks and we’re from the Douglas County area,” freshman Kylee Bremer said.
Like Cope and Jorgensen, Bremer travels out of state, even reaching Florida last year.
“Normally we travel out of state,” Bremer said. “We went to Florida, where we got 15th out of 130 teams in our World Series. Sometimes its local, but most of the time its out of town.”
Another future BHS softball team member is freshman Morgan Voigts who plays goes to great lengths to play travel ball. Voigts plays for Originals, out of Lee’s Summit, MO.
“It’s a good organization,” Voigts said. “It gets you ready for college, and our coaches set you up with other college coaches.”
In sports like football, college coaches recruit from camps and high school games because there are no club football teams that play each other. But in most other sports, athletes play in the off-season, where coaches show up at showcases and recruiting tournaments. This makes club sports crucial to reach goals like being Division 1 athletes.
“College coaches are more interested in watching club soccer,” Bandré said. “So by playing club, you have more of an opportunity for them to watch you play.”