All Midway High School senior Ella Clark has known her entire life is sports. In fact, athletics simply run through the Clark family’s veins.
The youngest of four siblings, her brothers, Luke and Jake, played football and baseball, while her sister, Emma, played softball, basketball and volleyball. It was only natural that she picked up a sport herself.
“I’ve literally grown up on a ball field and in Midway’s gym,” Clark joked during a recent interview. “I’ve been there for as long as I can remember. It was fun because I was watching one of my brothers, or watching my sister play volleyball. There was never really any downtime. Our family is really big into sports, so it was kind of a natural thing for me to go straight in to play myself. If I’m honest, I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.”
Like Emma, Clark has been a three-sport athlete, playing softball, basketball and volleyball for the Lady Raiders. She plays guard in basketball, shortstop for softball, and is a setter for volleyball.
As her final season at Midway approaches, Clark has a chance to clear a new milestone. She sits 447 assists away from hitting 2,000 total in her career. In her three years in volleyball, she’s recorded 41 kills, 374 digs, 663 service aces on an 86.9 serve percentage, and 1,553 total assists. She averages 6.8 assists per set.
“It’s super fun,” Clark said. “To be able to connect to my hitter and find out what they need and how to get that to them. It’s big for me to be able to have a chance to achieve that.”
When she’s on the court, the biggest focus she has is on having fun.
“I’ve always kind of just told myself that no matter what happens, even when the nerves come when I’m playing in front of a big crowd, I just remind myself that I’m playing for an audience of one, which is God.”
Over the course of her career, one moment stood out compared to the rest.
“My freshman year, I was playing for varsity, and it was the fourth round of the playoffs,” Clark recalled. “We played Ayden-Grifton, who was the number one seed in the playoffs. We ended up beating them, but I remember having a long serving session in the second set that helped us come back and win the game. The adrenaline and the amount of fun I had playing that game, I’ll honestly never forget that.”
Clark believes the comeback was sparked by the family dynamic that comes with sports at Midway.
“We just all love each other,” she attested. “Just to be able to have that trust in one another, that we can get done what we need to do, is just a huge factor within our team.”
As she’s grown, Clark has had to overcome mental hurdles in her career.
“Whenever I’m faced with a challenge, it’s gotten easier for me to face it,” she explained. “Growing up, I was always a perfectionist. No matter what I would do, it had to be perfect. I’ve had to learn not to get down on myself whenever I make a mistake.”
One of the ways that she did this was through her faith.
“I grew up within a very church-oriented family, so I was there every Sunday for Sunday school, she said. “It was just a huge part within our family. But also, even at school, a couple of others and I started a program called FCA (Fellowship for Christian Athletes) here at Midway. It’s a little club that we go to during our day to sit down and reflect on our week. We also try to build relationships centered around Christ and to do daily devotions within a group. I’m an officer for it, and a couple of my volleyball teammates are as well. Before a game, we try to sit down and do a daily devotion to bring us peace as players. That way, when we’re on the field, we just have that confidence in our identity in Christ.”
In addition to FCA, Clark is also a member of her school’s Beta Club. Trying to balance extracurriculars is something many student-athletes struggle with, but for Clark, it’s never been an issue.
“It’s definitely been a lot at times, but since I grew up doing it, I got used to being able to balance out my time and prioritize school over everything else,” she emphasized. “I also went to sports to help take relief from the stress of school, and it helped me take my mind off of it.”
Clark’s mom, Susan, is the current volleyball coach at Midway High. To be able to spend her final season under her tutelage is special for the Raider senior.
“I grew up with my parents coaching me in travel and rec ball,” she expressed. “So to be able to go through high school and be able to end my sports career with her as my volleyball coach is really important to me. It’s just really special to me to be able to go out on a limb with them.”
As a multi-sport athlete, she doesn’t have a natural favorite between volleyball, softball, and basketball. Instead, it usually rotates between which sport is in-season. Her softball career has seen Clark excel statistically, averaging a .413 batting average. Her 69 hits resulted in 48 RBI’s (runs batted in) as well as 69 runs scored. This past season, Clark maintained a .451 batting average in 89 plate appearances, recording 37 runs, 32 hits, and 29RBIs. She also hit two home runs, a career high. Despite the success at bat, she prefers to play defense in the infield.
“I’m defense all the way; I love fielding,” she explained. “It’s not easier for me, but it comes naturally to me. It’s just so fun to be able to cover from second to third. Being out there, I feel so in touch with the game. When it comes to hitting, it’s a “you” portion of the game, whereas in fielding, you have the whole team behind you. That’s just really special to me.”
Being an infielder requires vocal leadership, something that Clark feels is a strength for her.
“At shortstop, you’ve got to be a loud-mouth, which comes naturally for me,” she said. “I’m always talking to my teammates throughout the whole game, and it really helps me stay involved. I also make sure that I’m helping my teammates out with where they need to go on the next play, or what they need to do with the ball. Being able to uplift them in the game really comes in handy when I’m playing shortstop.”
The feeling of becoming a senior hasn’t sunk in just yet for Clark.
“If I’m being honest, it feels like another year,” she described. “I feel like I have the next year and then the next, like it hasn’t registered in my brain. But I know that once school starts, the last moments of my senior year will start to click that this is the final chapter.”
If the route towards playing the sport closes, she easily could see herself following her parents into full-time coaching. Teaching the fundamentals is a tiny bit of a challenge for Clark.
“I have such a hard time explaining the basics of how to play,” Clark admitted. “Because for me, it’s always been muscle memory in my brain because I learned at such a young age. So coming back and trying to teach these kids, it causes me to struggle with it, because I never know what to say or how to teach them. That’s something that I would have to work on. It also depends on where they are, like within their athletic ability within the sport. If they’re younger, maybe I start with the basics and help develop muscle memory. Things like fielding within softball or basic passing foundation in volleyball.”
Clark’s first step into her final year as a Lady Raider begins with a volleyball matchup against South Johnston High School on Tuesday, Aug. 18.