From the CHS Arena seats, at the beginning of every Coppell volleyball game, you can see each member of the volleyball team doing their ritual of dancing to build energy for their impending match.
If you look closer, you can find Coppell sophomore outside hitter Brooke Felix dancing in the center of it all, hyping up her teammates.
“The dancing has become fully routine at this point, and gets us out of our heads,” Felix said. “I feel like it’s something we must do every game and it’s just a lot of fun,”
Felix has leapt through many sports throughout the past six years, including soccer, track and tennis. However, a certain feeling sticks out to her with volleyball: belonging.
As an outside hitter for the Cowgirls, Felix first dipped her toe into the world of volleyball at Tejas Volleyball Club when she was 12.
“I had never really thought about volleyball before sixth grade until my mom signed me up at Tejas Volleyball Club and I ended up loving it,” Felix said.
Making the varsity team was an accomplishment, but also meant Felix had to work increasingly harder to set herself apart from her older peers. Through connecting with her teammates, she solidified herself as a valuable team asset.
“Brooke carries the offensive, so to be a sophomore and to have that responsibility which is usually a senior position is admirable,” Coppell coach Robyn Ross said. “She has been on varsity since her freshman year, so she has been able to take on a lot of responsibility with how young our team is,”
Through spending countless hours with her teammates practicing and competing, Felix has a newfound appreciation for the camaraderie required for volleyball.
“I feel like you have to be so close with your teammates and mesh together really well,” Felix said. “For volleyball, we’re with each other all the time. It just makes volleyball so much more fun because I feel we have all become best friends,”
In matches, Felix lets her competitive side shine, an attribute acquired from her family. Felix’s relationships with the people around her in accordance with sports stems from her family’s involvement in sports of all kinds, with her father Robby Felix playing professional football, her mother being a cheerleader, and her two younger sisters, Brylee and Bria Felix, playing soccer.
“We’re a pretty competitive family and Brooke is super competitive in her own right,” Mr. Felix said. “Her and her two younger sisters are always competing and trying to beat each other. She’s naturally just wound that way as well,”
She continues to prioritize her family and sports collectively through supporting her two younger sisters through their own endeavors.
“Both of my little sisters play soccer, so I’m always on the soccer field watching them play,” Brooke said. “My sister is at Coppell Middle School North so she does the middle school sports and I like to watch her in those too,”
Brooke’s volleyball journey is not ending at CHS. Beyond high school, she aspires to play at the collegiate level, determined to keep the same team mentality.
“My goal is to continue to play in college,” Felix said. “I feel like I can do it because I have such a good support system that makes me want to continue playing,”
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