Questions to Ask Senior Athletes

The questions

Open any question to see why it works.

1. 1

   How long have you been playing, and who got you into it?

   A gentle opener that almost always names a person: a parent, an older sibling, a coach at seven years old. That name is worth holding onto, because it gives you somewhere to return at the end of the interview.

2. 2

   What position do you play, and how did you end up there?

   Almost nobody chose their position. They were the tallest, or someone got hurt, or a coach moved them in the third week. The story of how they landed there is more interesting than the position itself and takes the pressure off early.

3. 3

   What do you remember about your first practice as a freshman?

   Seniors light up at this because it is the memory furthest from the version they usually tell. Expect being out of breath, being scared of a particular upperclassman, and getting something wrong in front of everyone.

4. 4

   What does a normal week look like during the season?

   The hours are the story, and most people outside the team have never added them up: lifting, film, practice, travel, homework in a bus seat. Ask them to count it rather than describe it, and the answer stops being generic.

5. 5

   What is the part of this sport that nobody outside the team ever sees?

   This is the question that produces the quotable line. Answers range from the tedium of drills to taping ankles at six in the morning to what the locker room sounds like after a loss. Follow up on whichever detail is most specific.

6. 6

   Which game will you actually remember in ten years?

   Note that it is not the biggest win. Asking this way gives them permission to name a loss, a rainy Tuesday, a game a teammate came back for. If they name the obvious one, ask what else was happening that day.

7. 7

   Which teammate makes practice better, and how?

   Seniors will praise the stars if you let them, so push for the specific behaviour: who talks, who stays late, who notices when someone is struggling. This is also how you find the underclassman worth writing about next year.

8. 8

   What has a coach said to you that you still repeat to yourself?

   You want the line itself, word for word, and the situation it was said in. If they offer only a slogan, ask when they last used it, which usually produces the real story behind it.

9. 9

   What is your pregame routine, and how much of it is superstition?

   Reliably funny and reliably specific: the same meal, the same sock order, a playlist, a call home. Ask what happens when the routine gets broken, because the answer says something about how they handle everything else.

10. 10

    What is the hardest thing you have had to get through here: an injury, being benched, a bad season?

    The first real question of the interview, so ask it once they are warm. Let them pick which one, and do not fill the silence. If they choose being benched, that is usually the more honest and less rehearsed answer.

11. 11

    What did you have to give up for this?

    Seniors rarely get asked about the cost, and the honest answers are concrete: a job, a music programme, sleep, most weekends, another sport they loved. It is the question that most changes how a reader sees the athlete.

12. 12

    What do you wish you had done differently in your first two years?

    Framed as regret rather than advice, so the answer is specific instead of motivational. It also lands better with the underclassmen who will watch this than anything phrased as a lesson.

13. 13

    How has your relationship with the sport changed since you were a freshman?

    Some seniors have fallen more in love with it and some are quietly finished, and both are worth hearing. Ask when the change happened and what caused it, because the answer is usually a moment rather than a slow drift.

14. 14

    Who is in the stands for you?

    Names, not categories. Grandparents who drive two hours, a sibling, a family friend who has been at every game since middle school. On senior night this is the question the audience is there for.

15. 15

    What would you tell the freshmen on this team?

    Every senior has an answer ready, so the follow-up is what does the work: ask what they would have ignored if someone had told them that at fifteen. That is where the honest version appears.

16. 16

    Are you playing after this, and how did you decide?

    Handle carefully, because for many seniors the answer is no and the decision was not entirely theirs. Ask about the deciding rather than the outcome, and let them say as much or as little as they want.

17. 17

    What are you going to miss more: the games, or everything around them?

    Nearly everyone says the bus rides, the locker room, the pregame music. Once they say it, ask for one specific afternoon that captures it, which turns a common answer into their own.

18. 18

    What will you do with the time you get back?

    A practical question that opens the future without making it about a career. Some have plans and some have never had a free autumn in their life, and that second answer is a genuinely interesting thing to sit with.

19. 19

    Who do you want to thank by name?

    Give them the floor and stay quiet. For a banquet video or a senior night read, this is the section that gets used, and people almost always name someone unexpected: a trainer, a bus driver, a teacher who let work slide during playoffs.

20. 20

    When you drive past this field in twenty years, what do you want to be thinking about?

    A closing question that asks for a picture rather than a summary. It usually gets an image instead of a stock phrase, which is exactly what you want as the last line of a profile.