‘Even though we weren’t out there, we did it together.’
–Captain Nya Gilchrist
By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
OCEAN CITY – After the Ocean City High School girls field hockey team won the sectional title Saturday, they ran to the Carey Stadium exit.
They weren’t running away. They were running to their three senior captains who were forced to watch the game from a second-story porch at a house across Fifth Street because they were under quarantine for COVID-19.
Seeing the celebration come to them sent the trio – Sophia Ruh, Katie Bowman and Nya Gilchrist – into tears.
The three girls and starting goalie Nora Bridgeford missed the playoffs because they had the misfortune to sit 6 feet from a student who tested positive for the coronavirus about 10 days earlier. None of them has tested positive for the virus.
Their parents had appealed to the administration and school board earlier in the week to allow them to sit in a corner of the stands, away from all the other fans, but the appeal failed.
Instead, they had a different vantage point.
“It was a really good opportunity to actually see the field,” Ruh said, “but if I couldn’t be there (on the field), I wanted my teammates to win it. They mean everything to me and I don’t know what I would do without them.”
When her teammates came running over, she said, “I started crying immediately.
“It means everything to us, really,” Ruh added. “We’ve been together for four years and we’re an awesome group. We love them so much.”
“It was definitely different because I wanted to be out there on the field in that game,” Bowman said. “It was better than watching it online to be sure and it was exciting to see the field from a different point of view, but definitely upsetting not to be playing.”
Seeing the girls come to them, she said, “It meant everything, just like the hard work from all four years came to me then because they did know we were part of the team.”
Gilchrist had faith her teammates were going to beat Egg Harbor Township.
“It definitely was intense, but I have so much faith and heart into this group. We’ve been working so hard for the past four years with the seniors. I knew they were going to win it,” Gilchrist said. “They were going to try their hardest and were going to put the ball in that cage and that’s what they did. “
She got a head start on Bowman and Ruh with the tears.
“I’m an emotional person so before they even walked over I was already crying,” she said, “but it just felt like we did it together. Even though we weren’t out there, we did it together. They played with their heart and we were with them the entire time.”