Team Retreat

Written by Natalie Hansen

The women's basketball retreat was held on September 25-27. Thanks to Lehman Hot Springs located in Wallowa Whitman National Forest. It has been customary at BMCC that the women’s basketball team goes on a team retreat every year before season. This year we went to Lehman Hot Springs. With only three returners it was basically a fresh start for everyone, we all barely knew each other. Having met maybe once or twice. I think everyone was wondering what are we going to do that is going to get us to bond? Well coach had that handled pretty well, it started with fun activities that let us interact with one another and also learn some things about everyone. It also consisted of going down to the hot springs for a dip in the cold one then a sprint to the hot one to get warm again. When Coach Martin suggested to jump into the cold pool I thought alright, it can’t be that bad right? Wrong. It was freezing! But myself, Coach Martin, Jenny, Bri, and Chelsi all jumped in regardless. So we jumped in, and as soon as we came to the surface immediately started screaming because it was so cold. A few of the freshmen thought we were crazy, which is probably fairly accurate, and tried to prank us. Little did they know we would get the best of them later that night.

While we were all enjoying the campfire Coach Martin starts to tell a “true” story about a dead one legged logger that haunts the woods. I actually thought Sandra was going to cry. A few of us being in on it just started feeding into the story, and after we all went to sleep there was a loud pounding on our door. Sandra actually did cry. Just kidding, while they denied it afterwards I know they were scared that night. They may never admit it.

We also had a few competitions while we were at the hot springs, one of them being a scavenger hunt. Telling a pack of 18-20 year old female athletes to go and find a bunch of random things and take a picture of it, and at the end of it there will be a winner and a loser is like adding gasoline to an already blazing fire. The scavenger hunt ended in a push up contest, which turned into an arm wrestling contest. And to this day no one is sure who won the scavenger hunt, because apparently we all have ADD when it comes to winning, when the opportunity for competition arises we jump at it like the pack of hungry wolves we are.

When we started this retreat we were ten strangers, with virtually nothing in common. We left as ten sisters, with one common goal; Success.