Getting global

The teammates come from all over the world — Canada, Bermuda, Scotland — as well as across the United States.

“The experience of learning about each other and each other’s cultures makes us special,” sophomore Jennifer Melnyk says.

Athletic Director Laing Kennedy says it gives the teammates an opportunity to mature and grow with different opinions.

DeVries says it is important to recruit all over the world.

“You go out and try to find the best players you can, no matter where they are in the world,” she says. “If you want to have a great team, you need to recruit all over the place.”

Spurling is from Bermuda and found Kent State on the Internet.

“I was looking for an American school with field hockey,” she says. “The coach invited me to come up and look around, and I liked it, so I sent in my application, and here I am.”

After she graduates, Spurling plans to return home to teach field hockey.

“My main reason for coming here was to see how Americans trained and then use that in my teaching,” she says.

Rahaim moved from Ann Arbor, Mich. for field hockey. Though her major is pre-business and she doesn’t intend to play field hockey beyond college, she played in high school and didn’t want to stop there.

“That will probably be it after college,” she says. “I’ll maybe coach a youth team or something.”

When you spend as much time together as this team does, a close bond is expected. Not only do they train together, practice together and travel together — they also hang out together.

“I mostly hang out with my teammates and some male athletes,” Grandinetti says. “We have a few other friends here and there, but it’s mostly my teammates.”

Melnyk says they go out together all the time to parties, dinner and movies.

“We spend a lot of time together,” she says. “It kind of forces us to be close to each other. I think anyone in that situation would be close.”

DeVries says the team often hangs out at her house. If they travel to a game in a teammate’s hometown, it’s their house they go to for relaxation.

“Last season we had team building every Wednesday,” DeVries says. “We would take turns going to different coaches’ houses and just get together and talk. You have people from all over the world. You’re going to be different people. But come game time, they all have to be in harmony.”

Many of them live in Prentice, where DeVries placed them when they were freshmen. Many came back and even roomed together.

“It’s very important that they’re a family and they’re there for each other,” DeVries says. “They develop as a person and a player and want to work harder.”

It’s also convenient.

“It’s good to room with a teammate because if Lauren wasn’t on the team she’d have to put up with me getting up at 6 in the morning,” Rahaim says of her roommate.

The girls can often be seen eating in groups in Prentice. After practice, they are the only ones awake and eating in the cafeteria. They sit at two or three tables talking about field hockey and devouring some well-deserved eggs and potatoes.

At dinner, they’re at the same tables — dominating the upstairs section of the cafeteria in their blue and yellow sweat suits.

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