By Ryan Franklin
Sports Editor
An athletic scholarship can be one of the highest honors a student-athlete can receive. For seniors Alex Rosen and Katie Saunders, this dream became a reality.
Rosen is about to start playing her eleventh season of competitive soccer for her club team Beach FC. After her first two years at Costa, during which Rosen started as left center back for Costa’s varsity soccer team, she decided to move past high school soccer and focus on club soccer and her education.
“I really wanted to focus on my academics,” Rosen said. “I knew if I continued playing soccer and focused on my education, things would work out for me.”
In March, after sparking the interest of many other schools, like the University of Oregon, Rosen received a scholarship to play soccer at Bucknell University. Knowing where she will attend college and play soccer next year at the start of her senior year is a blessing in its own.
“It was an amazing reward for all the hard work and hours of practice that I put into the game I love,” Rosen said.
With so many schools chasing Rosen, Bucknell turned out to be the easiest choice.
“Bucknell is just perfect,” Rosen said. “I knew it was my home the minute I arrived.”
After college, Rosen does not plan on playing professional soccer but wants to pursue a job in the FBI after studying criminology at Bucknell.
Katie Saunders has played softball for 13 years and will play in her fourth varsity season this spring. Saunders competes off campus with her club team, Minors Gold, in addition to playing Costa softball.
“My coach, Dick Amberik, is the reason I have gotten to this point,” Saunders said. “He developed me into the player I am.”
In July, Saunders received a scholarship from the defending national softball champions, the University of California, San Diego Tritons.
“It was a huge relief,” Saunders said. “My hard work really paid off, and I couldn’t be happier with my choice.”
She also received scholarship offers from Harvard and Dartmouth but decided that her home was in a Triton uniform.
“Playing for the defending national champs is an absolute honor,” Saunders said.
There is no American professional softball league, but Saunders will play slow pitch softball while trying to reach her dream of being an ESPN reporter.
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