The crowd cheers wildly as Anika Rajamani (12) sprints from third base, black hair streaming out from underneath her helmet. A cloud of dust rises as she slides into home base just as the fielder catches the ball.

Having played for nine and a half years, softball is a huge part of Anika’s life. Outside of school, she also plays club softball and will continue to play at Swarthmore college on a scholarship.

Ritika Rajamani (9), Anika’s younger sister reflects on seeing her sign on for college at the school ceremony.

“Watching her sign was one of the happiest moments in my life. She has been dreaming about signing for as long as I can remember,” Ritika said, “She’s worked so hard to get where she is right now and I look up to her so much.”

Anika loves being out on the field, getting into the game.

“The feeling of going up to bat: the pressure is on, it’s a game-winning play, and it’s a great feeling to have that experience because it’s not about being the center of attention but you get to be there, you’re making a difference and you have a whole team to support you,” she said. “It’s just fun to be out on the field.”

Besides just being a sport that she enjoys, softball has also helped Anika grow through various experiences, such as the time when she endured a major injury during her sophomore year that took her out for an entire competitive season.

“Although the injury stopped her from playing, it didn’t stop her from being a leader and a teammate and still being involved with the softball team,” Ria Gupta (12), a friend and softball teammate said.

She initially returned to the game after two months, but immediately re-injured herself, taking her out for even longer.

“It was hard to see [that] all the hard work I had done was going away because of this one injury which I honestly could have prevented just by not continuing to play on it,” Anika said.

Despite her continuous involvement in the team—stepping up and leading, helping others, and giving advice—being out of the game for seven months had its consequences.

“I really struggled when I came back—the mechanics were not there. I couldn’t even do simple things like throw and I was really struggling. [I was having] trouble throwing short distance and [my] confidence level was dropping,” she said.

Although it was difficult to get back into the game, she had the support of her friends and family, and she continued to push through and work hard to achieve her goals. Through this experience, she learned some valuable lessons.

“Know when to stop. Sometimes it’s not worth it to push yourself so hard that you just make everything worse,” Anika said.

Even though it was difficult, she managed to overcome it in the end.

“I feel like it turned her into a more resilient person, having to go through that,” Esha Deokar (12), another friend of Anika’s, said. “I think that’s the biggest impact it had on her day to day life.”

Besides her commitment to softball, Anika also participates in other activities such as Bharatnatyam, a genre of Indian classical dance that she has been doing since age six or seven. Bharatnatyam is something that she feels that she can always just get back into and is always there for her, an activity in which she could always feel good about herself, regardless of the breaks she takes from it for softball.

“I love performing and I love being on stage and expressing a story—connecting with the audience,” she said.

Her love of dance goes deeper than just the love of performing and self-expression.

“The major thing for me with dance is that it was a way for me to connect with my culture, so for me doing [dance] was a way for me to discover who my family was and where I was from, as well as learn the religious aspects of it. While I’m not overly religious, it was cool to understand the different stories and things that originate from Indian culture,” Anika said.

Although she has a small friend group of close friends, her outgoing personality allows her to make friends with everyone.

“She’s just so outgoing and that’s why you can talk to anyone about her, they know who she is and she’s always the one who’s laughing a lot or making her friends laugh,” Ria said. “She also has a sassy side to her, but I think that makes her personality even bigger and she’s just so fun to get to know.”