After a bad knee injury left her unable to continue playing volleyball, freshman Pieper Bell pivoted to golf last summer. The change came at the suggestion of her uncle, who let her practice on the green at the hotel he works at in Las Vegas.

Having just finished her first season with the La Salle girls golf team, Bell said she intends to continue with the sport throughout the rest of high school because she enjoys playing with the friends she’s made, and she finds the sport more relaxing than volleyball.

“I don’t have to stress out too much because I know the next move will be mine,” she said. “It’s not like in volleyball, where you have to figure out if it’s theirs [or] yours … you get to be calm.”

Outside of La Salle, Bell practices at two courses near her house, and on the weekends she takes lessons from a private coach who helped her prepare for this season.

While she wouldn’t say she’s very good yet, Bell has noticed that her coach’s teaching style has changed as she’s improved — when she messes up, he now asks her to identify the mistake herself rather than just tell her what’s wrong.

Bell chose to join La Salle’s golf team rather than only taking lessons because, as an incoming freshman, she hoped to build a community here.

“I wanted to have a way to have people I knew around La Salle that weren’t just freshmen,” she said.

Additionally, she mentioned that being on a team is better for visibility to college scouts, which is one of the reasons she decided to play with La Salle. Every year, many women’s golf scholarships go unclaimed, and she hopes to eventually get good enough to snag one, she said.

While Bell does not have much of a preference between competition and practice, she said she does enjoy strengthening her bond with her teammates and getting to make friends with people from other schools during competitions.

“I think it’s more about just being around each other, not really playing together,” she said. “You get people to talk to, instead of just being by yourself or with a coach.”

Bell explained that while golf isn’t necessarily a team sport, it is a community sport, which she said suits her extroverted personality well.

“I try not to be quiet because if I’m quiet, then I feel like it’ll make other people not want to be talking,” Bell said. “Normally, I just introduce myself [and] say my age.”

She noted in all these introductions, she has never played with another freshman, which is also true for her experience playing La Salle golf.

As the only freshman on the La Salle team, Bell feels slightly left out at times, as there are certain things she can’t relate to, like prom. But as the season comes to a close, Bell said she has grown to love playing with all the girls on the team, despite her initial doubts about whether she would fit in.

“I was really scared because I was going to be the only freshman on the team,” she said. “But all the girls are really super sweet and super supportive, and when you mess up, they don’t make a big deal about it.”

While practices with her personal coach give her more essential one-on-one instruction, Bell said, there’s less pressure on her when she plays at La Salle, because the focus is spread across all the girls on the team rather than just her.

“It’s less stressful when I play because not everybody’s looking at all my bad moves — they’re focusing on themselves,” she said. “When I’m with my outside-of-school coach, [he’s] only focused on how I’m doing.”

Next year, Bell’s coach wants her to make the jump to varsity and play the full 18 holes, but she’s not too sure. Her current level is already mentally draining, she said, as the nine holes that JV plays already can take more than an hour.

“Nine holes is already a little too much for me … I already feel done with it,” Bell said. “So 18 holes is going to be way too much for me.”

In general, golf is a very mental game, she explained.

“I feel like physically, I could play it whenever, but mentally, you just can’t think too much about it,” she said. “If you do really bad on one hole, that doesn’t mean you’re going to do bad on the next, but in your mind, you already have that going.”

Reflecting on her first season, Bell said she has done well in this aspect, trying to stay optimistic both for herself and her teammates.

“I think I was really good at keeping a positive attitude when we were in competitions, and I try to be very talkative,” she said.

Though she isn’t sure whether she wants to participate in competitions this summer, as it would make her schedule fuller, she does intend to continue practicing with her coach in preparation for next year.