Being injured is already hard enough, but when it is your last year playing as a senior, and your team is doing well, it is extremely difficult. 

For instance, three seniors, Cameron Kamlowsky, Bobby Collins and Jessica Kline-Koester, were going through this during the history-making season for the football and girls’ soccer teams, both of which made it all the way to the second round of playoffs. 

Senior wide receiver Cameron Kamlowsky got hurt before the season started in a scrimmage.

“It didn’t hurt,” he recalled. “I was in shock, but once I realized what had happened, I started to cry, because I knew I wouldn’t play my senior year.

“My friends and the football team came to visit a lot at first when it happened,” he said, “and they were all together in the hospital the night it happened.” 

Kamlowsky spent the rest of the season cheering on his teammates from the sidelines.

“It’s one of the hardest things I’ve had to do in my whole life, especially since we’re doing so well this year.” Kamlowsky said at the end of October. 

Kamlowsky has been playing football since first grade. During his Senior Night Nov. 1, he wore his football pads and walked onto the field for a snap, for the first and last time, with the support of his family and teammates. 

“It was really special,” he said of Senior Night, “especially since I’ve been sidelined all year watching all my friends get to play. It was hard not to get emotional because it was the first and last time I’d be in a game for Streetsboro which was hard to accept, but Springfield’s players and their coaches all knew what was happening, so they were all supportive of it.”

Though Kamlowsky’s plans after high school include playing college football, “I don’t have any film to put out from my senior year, which will make it rough,” he said, “and a lot of schools that were on the fence saw I got hurt and pulled back. Mount Union is still very interested and I might go there to play.”

Kamlowsky’s fellow senior Robert “Bobby” Collins did not get hurt while playing football. Instead, he got hurt during one of his football drills, landing on his left shoulder wrong. Collins ended up needing surgery, which put him out for the season.

“When it first happened I didn’t think I was going to have surgery, but when I finally got the news it was lowkey messed up and [then] I was lowkey sad.” 

Collins said he was looking forward to playing, because he only had played his freshman year at his old school, Bedford High School. 

He plans on doing track, shot-put and discus in the spring and has plans on doing track in college. Collins is unable to play football in college due to this year’s injury and not playing his sophomore or junior year. “Basically, I wasn’t focused enough on the sport [football],” he explained. “I only got to play my freshman year and not my senior year.”

In addition to these two football players who were unable to fully participate in such successful seasons with their teams, Kline-Koester tore her ACL during an early-season game against Revere. 

“I felt upset,” she recalled. “I felt like I would be missing out on everything that everyone else was able to do.” 

Kline-Koester started playing soccer her freshman year of high school and the surgery for her torn ACL ended her high school soccer career.

“I am physically not able to do everything I usually do,” she said. “I am really not used to staying home and not doing anything, and it took a big mental toll on me.” 

While happy for her teammates and friends, Kline-Koester said it was difficult to watch everything play out from the sidelines and not have the same experience her friends had.

“I felt super happy for them for going so far this past year when no one thought we could. But I was also sad I wasn’t able to play in that last game, watching my best friends play together and hug after the game ended knowing it was their last game ever playing as a team was tough because I didn’t get that feeling on the field for my senior year.”