While the district offers many sports teams, including football, basketball, soccer and golf, there are a select few sports that it does not provide, requiring athletes who play them to look elsewhere to continue their athletic careers. The students who play these sports not included in the Bulldog catalog, such as swimming or ice hockey, often must compete for other districts or programs in the greater area, making them independent athletes.
While independent athletes have long been a part of the culture in the district, the number of them has decreased over the years. As recently as last year, the district featured six such athletes: Kara Aland (‘25), Sara Aland (‘25), Payton Bickerstaff (‘25), Noah Fessides (‘25), Kallie Brown (12) and Alec Lockwood (11).
This year, however, the decrease in independent athletes has been sharp. Brown and Lockwood continue to compete in their respective programs. At the same point in time, Alexander Weaver (9) has made the jump up to the high school level of athletics in swimming.
Just like their in-house counterparts, through years of hard work and dedication, these athletes have a story—how they started, what got them hooked and their moments in the spotlight.
Brown currently takes part in competitive dancing for the Maria’s School of Dance, located in New Brighton. She has danced at the Maria’s School of Dance for 12 years. She got her start in the world of dance picking up classes after her parents noticed her enthusiasm for performing. Throughout her time in dance, Brown and the other members on the squad for the studio have achieved their own successes and moments. One important moment for the group was winning the Turn It Up competition for their competitive dance.
Around the same time, Lockwood skated onto the ice for the first time in his hockey career; however, hockey runs much deeper in his blood. Lockwood got his start years before stepping onto the ice. He began playing dek hockey, a form of ice hockey that utilizes surfaces much like the floor of a gymnasium, as well as a ball rather than a puck. He played a season of dek hockey before making the jump up to ice hockey in 2014 due to the challenge it presented and the enjoyment skating brought him.
When he made the jump in 2014, he joined the Beaver County Badgers, an amateur hockey team in the area that plays in the Pittsburgh Amateur Hockey League (PAHL). Lockwood has found quite a bit of success during his tenure on the Badgers team. Last season, Lockwood and the Badgers won the double-banner, claiming first place in the regular season, as well as winning the championship, which is a huge honor in the PAHL.
“It was awesome,” Lockwood said. “I was overwhelmed with happiness when we won.”
He has also been playing for the Central Valley Warriors through a co-op agreement. While the Warriors have struggled in recent years, Lockwood performed as a key depth piece, bumping up the physicality and defence while on the ice, making hits, swiping the puck away and breaking up offensive opportunities. That physicality, however, has come back to bite him.
On Dec. 16, during a game against Connellsville, Lockwood took a hit and went down. After taking a moment to get up, he exited the game with what the trainers thought was a potential concussion. He did not return to the game and soon after, exited the rink. He took time to recover over the winter break from action. He returned for their game at Morgantown on Jan. 8.
While Brown and Lockwood have been in their respective sports for a while, Weaver is a rather new face in independent athletics. Weaver has been competitively swimming for two years, but has swum before. He started swimming when he was little, but quit. During his time in middle school, however, he got back into swimming, being around most of the Beaver Falls swim team.
Today, Weaver swims for the high school, but attends meets and competitions with the Beaver Falls team. There is no co-op agreement in place, though. He still competes in the district’s red and white even though the district does not have an official team. Much of the reason is that the district does not have enough swimmers to form a team, much like the issue that the cross-country team had last year. Weaver has still been doing well in his own right, though. He has won multiple events at meets, including the 100-meter-backstroke.