A superstition is a widely held but unjustified belief in supernatural motive leading to certain consequences of an action or event, or a practice based on such a belief. In simpler words, a superstition is a belief that if one small event happens, it could be the only way to have a positive outcome. Here at Bernards, the football team has quite a few superstitions of their own. One specific example of the teams many superstitions would be head coach Jon Simoneau’s superstition. When asked if he had a personal superstition, he said that he “always wears sunglasses. Whether it is snowing or a night game, I always have them on.” Another superstition that Coach Simoneau talked about was about jumping jacks. As funny as it may sound, the Bernards Football team is very much against jumping jacks. If they see the other team doing jumping jacks, their sideline will go nuts cheering because they believe that it is a bad omen for them and will cause them to win. For this reason, the Bernards Football team never does, nor will they ever do jumping jacks.

The football team is not the only esteemed Bernards team with a superstition/pregame ritual. The Bernards Field Hockey team has a very interesting pre-game ritual of their own. This superstition has been going on for ten years, it is a chant that is whispered in a huddle formed by the starters before every game. According to captain, Emma Christus, the chant goes, “those who have the will to win cannot be beat. Bernards pride.”

The Bernards team with probably the most individual superstitions would be the girls tennis team. All of these superstitions came to light after an interview with captain Molly Kauffman. One thing she mentioned was that her and her doubles partner, Becky Baldwin have three superstitions by themselves. The first is that only Becky can open the can of tennis balls and change the scorecard. They also high five in between every point and they can only use tennis balls with the number 3 or 4. One superstition that was shared between two players is the fact that Ella Dov and Paige Paladini must both wear their hair in buns. The superstitious beliefs don’t stop there for Paige, though. She also will not drink water between games, only sets, and never uses a shock absorber on her tennis racket. More beliefs involve the wearing of jewelry. Junior Julia Paladini must wear all of her jewelry, especially her rings, and Katherine Apt has to wear her necklace. The last superstition on this team is again shared by two players. Neeyati Sheth and Katherine both have to use even balls. All in all, Bernards High School seems to have some very superstitious athletes.