Q: What position do you play?

Durbin: Forward.

Q: When did you start playing soccer?

Durbin: When I was three.

Q: What made you start?

Durbin: My mom. [She]  played soccer through college, so she just kind of put me into it.

Q: What’s made you stick with it?

Durbin: It’s really fun being with teammates and just the sport in general, to be competitive. 

Q: What challenges have you faced as a high school student athlete?

Durbin: Time management is one; if you have game days and you only have two hours at home it’s hard to manage if you have a lot of homework, but it gets easier.

Q: What’s been the greatest moment of your season so far?

Durbin: Probably my three goals against St. Dominic, I was pretty proud of that.

Q: If you met someone who had never heard of soccer, how would you describe it to them?

Durbin: It’s not just kicking a ball into a net. It takes a lot of teamwork and focus on one goal. It’s a little bit of using your feet to kick the ball, but it’s a lot more connected and technical than that. 

Q: What makes you a great player individually?

Durbin: I’d definitely say my effort, effort and my work rate, like, I just give 100% all the time.

Q: What about as a teammate?

Durbin: My support for my teammates-I don’t really care about if I score if someone else, as long as as a team, we’re together and cohesive, and we’re all being successful.

Q: Would you say soccer changed who you are?

Durbin: I’d say it definitely had a major impact on shaping who I am. Even the good parts of knowing to be a part of a team and getting to be teamwork and building relationships with people, and also the struggles of getting over a tough loss or getting over mental barriers. It definitely makes you stronger as a person. 

Q: When you were struggling, what made you still stick with the sport instead of quitting?

Durbin: My parents, just because I wanted to keep playing for them. Also I didn’t want one little thing to be like oh I quit because of this-I knew I could push past it.

Q:So what do you do in track?

Smith: I’m a sprinter. So the 100, 200, and 400.

Q: Why did you start running track?

Smith: I really started because I thought I was fast and I thought it would be fun.

Q: What’s kept you sticking with it? 

Smith: I enjoy all the practices, and then the meets with everybody. It gives me something to work towards.

Q: What kind of challenges have you faced through years as a high school student-athlete?

Smith: I guess trying to find a good balance between school and sports. Because, you know, with practice and everything, it’s hard to find a good fit, doing homework and stuff to make sure you’re ready for your test.

Q: So what do you do to help you balance it out?

Smith: You just have to work on time management. I guess you can’t really just mess around, you have to keep working. 

Q: What was the greatest moment of your season this year so far? 

Smith: Oh, breaking the school record. Something nice I guess, not too bad. 

Q: Did you know you were gonna do it that day? 

Smith: That day? Yeah, I would say so. Going into it, I thought so. 

Q: So what were the reactions like after you broke the record?

Smith: I don’t remember, actually, what happened. I just remember I just got picked up, I don’t even know who it was, and everybody was yelling and stuff.

Q: Do you think track has changed your life or changed who you are?

Smith: Yeah, definitely.

Q: How so?

Smith: I mean, [my] work ethic has changed from it. It helps for school and other things as well outside of the track. And the preparation and stuff kind of translates to life outside the track as well. 

Q: If you could try another track event besides sprints, what would you do?

Smith: I would like to do pole vault, that’d be fun. Or throw javelin maybe.