On game days, waking up around 7 a.m. and not going to bed until midnight or even 1 a.m. is what senior athletes, Blake Feiza and Jenni Weber, have to undergo during their basketball season. Both of their routines differ when it comes to preparation in the mornings, balancing their time, game day schedules, practices and pre-game rituals.

Weber and Feiza can agree that the hardest part about being a student athlete is juggling school and basketball. Especially on game days, when they have late nights, it’s hard to find time to do their homework and/or study.

However, since Weber and Feiza have been on the basketball team for four years now, they have built lifelong relationships.

“Being with the teammates is my favorite part of being on a team. They are a great group of people,” Weber said.

When it comes to getting ready for practice, Weber and Feiza have different preparation styles.

“I like to pack my stuff up the night before,” Feiza said.

While Weber has more of a grab her stuff and go kind of morning.

“I just throw in random shorts, a random jersey and go from there,” Weber said.

On practice days, Weber and her team have specific practice styles depending on what teams they play that week.

“We work on their defense and what our offense would be against it. Then, we do shooting drills and rebounding. Mostly, just things we need to work on. And finally, we scrimmage,” Weber said.

When comparing the girls’ practices to the boys, they aren’t too different.

“We do an active warm up into some ball handling. Then we do some drills, scrimmage and do offensive work,” Feiza said.

For the boys basketball team, their schedule on game days starts with a team meal time.

“We go to Subway. We come back, watch film, go watch the first half of the sophomore game, and then we go shoot,” Feiza said.

Instead of a Subway run, the girls either can go home for an hour, or stay at school.

“We watch film and talk about our game plan before. Then we go and shoot. Then we go watch the sophomores play. Finally, we go to our locker room, prepare for our game, and then play,” Weber said.

Weber can’t forget to eat her barbecue pringles before every game because it’s her good luck, while Feiza likes to listen to music before each game.

Speaking of pre-game rituals, Weber and Feiza have interesting superstitions that make or break the way they play.

“I have this one pair of socks that make me play bad. I keep them so that they don’t end up anywhere else. If I throw them away, and if they reuse them to make different socks and I buy them, I will play bad. So I have to keep them, but I never wear them,” Weber said.

Even though Feiza doesn’t have a superstition dealing with socks, it still has to do with an article of clothing.

“I can not play in short sleeve shirts, it needs to be cutoffs,” Feiza said.

Without a doubt, both Weber and Feiza love watching each other’s team out on the court and can agree that they both will do big things this season.

“I love watching the boys play. I think they work really hard and I  love watching them succeed. They come to our games so I am just happy when they win and when we win,” Weber said.