Rocket Spotlight on...Karson Hill

Karson Hill is on track to receive her bachelor's degree in exercise science with a concentration in pre-medicine this December. She just finished her third season on the Toledo women's soccer team, is a member of Rocket Rise, and has served two years as a Campus Captain ambassador for The Hidden Opponent.

On her soccer career and finding herself at Toledo
I grew up playing with my sister and brother, so it was always a part of my life but I did not start to do travel soccer until later than everyone else. Going into my freshman year everyone was making a switch to bigger clubs in the state. I tried out for the club team, and it worked out well. I went with that full steam ahead. I played two years of high school soccer, so for my junior and senior years I stuck with club soccer. It's normal for people to quit high school soccer and just stick with a club, depending on the conference your club was in, if you were allowed to also play for your high school team. I was lucky to have a conference where I was allowed to play both, but I found it more beneficial to stay with a club the whole time if I wanted to play in college.

On being recruited to Toledo
I came to Toledo as a courtesy visit. I had no intention of coming here but my family had a friend who was friends with (former head coach) TJ Buchholz, and they were saying to just try out because Toledo was looking for a goalie. I loved the relationship and the closeness of the team here.

On deciding to major in pre-med
I have switched my concentration a few times. I started with neuroscience then got interested in sports medicine with me being in sports myself. I moved away from pre-med and then came back to it because I've always been interested in the body and all the different systems.

The specialty I want to go into is physical medicine and rehabilitation because I like the long-term relationship you can create with the patients, specifically in the neuromuscular systems in the body. It will allow me to work closely with people who have those disorders and help them create a treatment plan so they can get by. I've worked closely with some people in my church who have it and I loved creating relationships with them because they are the best people with amazing personalities and attitudes towards life. I think people just assume that they have a negative outlook on life, but I find it's quite the opposite and that we can all learn a lot from spending time with these people.

On her academics and plans for after graduation this December
In high school, my parents always encouraged me to take advantage of all the opportunities we had in our school, I followed my curiosities and took as many AP classes as possible, so coming into college set me up very well and I came in with 19 credit hours already accounted for. I worked closely with all my professors, creating good relationships with them, and also got some experience working in the research labs. I just took advantage of the little free time I had, studied hard, and spent a lot of hours in the library.

I'm planning on taking a gap year and I'm going to work as a medical assistant so I can get paid while getting experience in the medical field and then the year after that I'm going to med school. I have a couple of dream schools like Dartmouth, and then location-wise I would love the University of California-San Diego or Washington.

On her experience as a Rocket student-athlete
I've had a really good time here at Toledo. Everyone is supportive and we have a close relationship within the team. We've had a lot of girls on the team, so you expect some players to get lost in the chaos and relationships to drive apart. I think as a whole we've stayed close, especially through coaching changes which is hard to do. We've done a really good job staying close. It's a competitive environment in practice and games and we expect a lot from each other, it's a good place to grow and learn from each other.

On her campus involvement with Rocket Rise
I asked TJ Buchholz if there was an athlete bible study and he got me involved and in contact with Matt and Wendy Yeager from Rocket Rise. People don't see athletes and their faith coming together in a big group like that so I love that I can interact with athletes from swim & dive, football, and basketball. Everyone is there, and you get to know everyone on a different level and it's cool. As an officer, we work with semester planning and outreach with the different teams and take turns leading messages throughout the year. It's a wonderful environment, which is one of the reasons I decided to come here.

Players Mentioned

Karson Hill

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