For the longest time, I was convinced I was going to be the next Brandi Chastain. I constantly daydreamed of scoring the final penalty kick to win the World Cup, just like she had. When I was alone in my room, I’d rehearse my goal celebration over and over, imagining the moment frozen on the cover of Sports Illustrated.
Then, I stopped growing at the end of middle school. Clocking in at just 5 feet 3 and three-fourths inches, my dreams of an athletic career were long gone by the time I stepped foot on Penn’s campus. Instead, I was dead set on becoming a doctor. But I just couldn’t stay away from sports.
Like it does for most kids at Penn, the fall of my first year came with plenty of rejection. Penn women’s club soccer, Penn Engineering Council, Penn Assistive Devices and Prosthetic Technologies, Penn Biomedical Engineering Society — the list goes on and on. While the no’s continued to roll in, I got the one yes I needed from The Daily Pennsylvanian Sports department — even though I had no previous journalism experience.
Well, mainly because they accepted all their applicants. But I didn’t know that at the time.
When I walked into the Pink Palace for the first time, I was greeted by the department’s eccentric leadership trio that consisted of Matthew Frank, Esther Lim, and Eashwar Kantemneni. I felt oddly at home. Suddenly, I wasn’t the weird one for having an encyclopedic memory for statistics and trivia. I was surrounded by a group of people who were equally as obsessed with sports as I was.
The summer after my first year, I was given the chance to write about former Penn softball pitcher Jennifer Brann, who was then working as a baseball analyst for the Miami Marlins. In the feature, I highlighted the challenges she faced as a woman in a male-dominated field. At the time, she was the only female baseball analyst on the Miami staff, and that resonated with me since I was one of just a few women in DPOSTM.
Seeing her carve out a space in a field where she was the exception inspired me to do the same within the DP. I decided to run for sports editor.
The time commitment almost certainly meant I would have to take a gap year if I still wanted to pursue medicine, and it also meant risking my GPA. Yet, even with all those cons, it never crossed my mind to walk away from the opportunity. Running for sports editor was the first time I chose what I loved over what I thought I should do.
Did my grades suffer? A little. Did I miss out on plenty of social hangouts with friends because of my commitments to the DP? Definitely. But would I change anything? Absolutely not.
I’d like to thank Brandon Pride and Matthew Frank for introducing me to what DPOSTM is all about, Alexis Garcia for guiding me through the elections process, Walker Carnathan for being my partner in crime during our tenure as sports editors, my parents for being incredibly supportive of me as I pursue my passions, and last but not least, my best friend, girlfriend, and ex-HBIC Norah Rami for reminding me that this column was due today.
I am eternally grateful for my time with DPOSTM. It truly was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that opened doors I didn’t know existed. As a Maryland native who grew up a diehard Baltimore Ravens and Orioles fan, never in a million years did I think I would return home to cover those same teams as a reporter for The Baltimore Banner.
But that is exactly what the future holds. I may not have become a professional soccer player like the younger version of me once dreamed, but standing on the sidelines this summer, I’ll know I’ve made it to the big stage in my own way.
VIVIAN YAO is an Engineering senior studying bioengineering from Clarksville, Md. She served as sports editor on the 140th Board of The Daily Pennsylvanian, Inc. Her email is vyao@seas.upenn.edu.
