Senior lacrosse star plays her way to USC

 By Meem Mohsin,

HUB Staff Writer–

 

While many seniors are anxious about being accepted to the college of their dreams, senior Kylie Drexel has already had her future set since the seventh grade.

“All different kinds of schools were interested in recruiting me around seventh grade before University of Southern California had a program for it,” Drexel said. Drexel formed close ties with USC because her dad had attended the university and had worked there for 15 years.

Drexel became more interested in USC because many of her family members lived in the area and Drexel was born in Los Angeles. “I always wanted to be a Trojan but they didn’t have a lacrosse team back then, so it was harder for me to have it as a top choice,” Drexel said.

Since Drexel’s freshman year, she has visited many schools and camps to get showcased and attended many tournaments such as the Norcal team. “That’s when I started realizing that I had more potential than I thought I did,” Drexel said.

Her top five colleges she was interested in before committing to one were USC, North Western, North Carolina, Duke and Princeton. She claims that Stanford was high up there as well, but after visiting the school, she realized she didn’t really like it there because it was only about prestige.

Just before Drexel was going to visit Princeton, her club coach called to let her know that the head coach of USC was interested in recruiting her. “I posted on my coach’s wall wishing her a happy birthday which the head coach of USC happened to see, and she saw me play before so she made my coach call me and let me know she wanted to talk to me,” Drexel said.

As soon as Drexel had called the head coach of USC, she wanted Drexel to come down to L.A. immediately since she was aware that Drexel had already been recruited by many other schools.

“At that time, I realized Princeton wouldn’t have been a good choice for me anyway because meeting their academic requirements would have been extremely hard and I wanted to play and win national championship, so USC seemed like the better option where I could handle both school and sport,” Drexel said.

She attended a USC camp the summer as a junior and loved it. “They have me a great offer, and I was getting a lot of money so I committed right then and there in the head coach’s office!” Drexel said.

To keep up with her academics and sports, USC offers each player their own tutor. When they travel for games, the offer includes five tutors to go on with the team so they can get all their work and studying done in that time. “It’ll help a lot so we aren’t too stressed out when we come back because we won’t have enough time to make up all that work,” Drexel said.

To prepare physically, Drexel works out four to five hours a day. She does the P90x which she claims is a beneficial program for her.

Her coach provides her fitness packets in order to prepare her as well. “The coach wants us to be in good shape already when we get there because they basically want to just teach us the skills later on that we’ll need,” Drexel said.

“All I have to do is send in my application to my coaches and they flag it so it goes right through.I’m really excited to be a part of the Trojan family!” Drexel said.