![“[Building nerf blasters] became this outlet of creativity for me that hasn't been matched by anything else. The process [of] making a build complete to your desire is such a painstakingly difficult process, but I've had to learn from [the skills needed from] soldering to proper painting. There's so many different options for everything, if you think about it, it exists. The best part is [that] if it doesn't exist, you can build it yourself," Ishaan Parate said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/DSC_8149-900x604.jpg)
![“When I came into high school, I was ready to be a follower. But DECA was a game changer for me. It helped me overcome my fear of public speaking, and it's played such a major role in who I've become today. To be able to successfully lead a chapter of 150 students, an officer team and be one of the upperclassmen I once really admired is something I'm [really] proud of,” Anvitha Tummala ('21) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Screen-Shot-2021-07-25-at-9.50.05-AM-900x594.png)
![“I think getting up in the morning and having a sense of purpose [is exciting]. I think without a certain amount of drive, life is kind of obsolete and mundane, and I think having that every single day is what makes each day unique and kind of makes life exciting,” Neymika Jain (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Screen-Shot-2017-06-03-at-4.54.16-PM.png)
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![“[Volleyball has] taught me how to fall correctly, and another thing it taught is that you don’t have to be the best at something to be good at it. If you just hit the ball in a smart way, then it still scores points and you’re good at it. You could be a background player and still make a much bigger impact on the team than you would think,” Anya Gert (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AnnaGert_JinTuan_HoHPhotoEdited-600x900.jpeg)
![“I'm not nearly there yet, but [my confidence has] definitely been getting better since I was pretty shy and timid coming into Harker my freshman year. I know that there's a lot of people that are really confident in what they do, and I really admire them. Everyone's so driven and that has really pushed me to kind of try to find my own place in high school and be more confident,” Alyssa Huang (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AlyssaHuang_EmilyChen_HoHPhoto-900x749.jpeg)
Girls lacrosse loses to Christian Brothers in home league game
Co-captain Natasha Mayor (12) runs while cradling the ball as two opponent players chase after her. The girls lost 7-20 to the Christian Brothers.
April 29, 2016
The varsity girls’ lacrosse team lost 7-20 to the Christian Brothers High in a home league game Wednesday on David Field at 5 p.m.
During the first half of the game, even though they were one man down, the girls came out solid with a strong defense and were able to score six goals, while the opponents scored eight goals.
Despite the small difference in scoring between the two teams at the end of the first half, the Christian Brothers scored four goals in the first three minutes of the second half, and scored another eight goals by the end of the match, bringing the score up to a 7-20.
The girls are currently ranked 2-21-1 overall and 0-6 in league.
“We were doing really well considering that for half of the first half, we were one man down, but I think second half, we definitely had a decline in our confidence and that made the other team score increase more than it should have,” Jenna Sanders (10), who plays attack on the team, said. “I think that we need to work on our defense and also getting open on attack for passes.”
This season, the girls have competed against some top schools so far, such as Castilleja and Gunn, as well as several teams they haven’t played against before.
“I think we were feeling the brunt of what’s been a pretty hard season for us; we’ve been playing a lot of pretty hard teams, most of whom are not in our league, so we’ve been suffering some losses that we’re not used to so I think we felt that a lot today and we kind of lost our morale,” Aditi Maheshwari (11) said.
Andrew Newmark, assistant coach of the girls’ team this year, spoke about the girls’ improvement over the course of this season.
“They definitely have improved, all around the board: passing, catching, ground-balls and just kind of sportsmanship and enthusiasm in general; now we’re getting into those more complex parts of lacrosse like playmaking and understanding and recognizing certain situations so that still has a little ways to come, but we’re definitely getting there,” Newmark said. “The rest of the season I hope that everybody remains happy and healthy and hopefully we can manage to take a couple wins out of the rest of the games that we have.”
As a co-captain this year, Alayna Richmond (11) felt that the girls have grown a lot together as a team, as well as herself, who has had the chance to be a leader of the group.
“At the beginning of the season, we played more individually but as the season has gone on, we’ve learned to work together and communicate better and that’s made us a stronger team overall,” Alayna said. “I think I have learned to be one of the stronger voices out in the field because we need there to be an authoritative leader who’s going to get everyone to work together and enforce the commitment.”
The girls will compete against Aragon High at a home game next Wednesday at 5 p.m.
