For many high school students, Friday nights consist of football games, friends and late-night fun. For the girls’ swim and dive team, one Friday night grants girls a special surprise — a team tradition known as senior wakeup. 

A closely guarded secret to the majority of the team, senior wakeup serves as the perfect energizer in the middle of the season as spirits start to dwindle because of exhaustion. Seniors divide all underclassmen team members into districts, then call parents and inform them of the annual tradition in addition to hours of planning the logistics of the event. 

Seniors spend all four years of their swim career looking forward to the time they can plan a wakeup and execute the kidnapping. New senior Annika Strasman, originally from Oregon, has a different experience: she’s planning a team-tradition she’s never experienced. 

“Nearly all of the other girls on this team had been kidnapped in previous years, and I never had the chance to experience that, so I wasn’t sure what they were expecting of me.”

Thankfully, seniors with four years of experience on the team are willing to answer Annika’s questions and welcome her into the sisterhood that is Neenah Swim and Dive. 

On Friday night, Annika, along with all other seniors, welcome an entire team of girls to the high school at 10 p.m. Like young children on Christmas morning, the girls’ palpable energy surrounds the fieldhouse. Girls enjoy time playing elbow tag and bunny-bunny (a high energy, team favorite game), eating pizza and ice cream and competing in cannonball contests.

Annika joins the freshmen in experiencing a team tradition for the first time, and for her, the goal is simple: “I just want to further bond with my teammates and make sure that everyone has fun!”