By Thomas Lyons '26
 
Growing up, Imani Ochieng '25 said she hesitated to tread onto the field hockey turf. Not for the usual reasons (fear of stick clashing, high-speed flying objects, and funny-looking goggles), but because of her family's legacy on that field.
 
"My dad was an Olympian, my mom was almost an Olympian," Imani said. "In a way, [those successes] made me shy away from field hockey more than other sports."
 
Now a star left back on the Wesleyan field hockey team, she has wholeheartedly joined the family's love of the game. Instrumental to her field hockey journey, Imani said, has been her father's role modeling and coaching.
 
"I don't think many people get to have such a personal trainer," Imani said of her dad. "As I got older, I realized he actually knows what he's talking about."
 
These days, Imani and her father Victor Ochieng often discuss the game. On Imani's bus ride back from a match versus Bates earlier this season, the two reflected on the match over Zoom.
 
"I know he'll be honest with me," Imani said in a recent interview. "That's a really big thing for me to improve as a player and as a person."
 
Unfortunately, the game's result (a 0-3 loss) didn't line up with Victor's aspirations.
 
"I didn't watch that one, but I hope they've beat them 7-0," he laughed.
 
Though he couldn't make the drive to Waterville, Maine, Imani said her father will often come up from Pennsylvania to watch home games in person, cheering from the sidelines.
 
"My teammates say it's so nice to have someone there who actually knows the game," Imani laughed.
 
"I just come [to the games] to enjoy and have fun," Victor said. "In part I'm watching her, but I'm also watching the whole pitch. I'm watching for five potential passes, or somebody else daydreaming when they're supposed to have been creative."
 
Post-game breakdowns with a parent can be difficult given any circumstances, but one imagines Olympic presence heightens the stakes of the conversation's back and forth.
 
Not so anymore, Victor said. From pubescent contention, they've matured to a mutual understanding of how to approach the obstacles of both the game and life.
 
"Now that she's older, communication is fantastic," Victor affirmed. "When she was 13, I told her she was not allowed to come off the pitch [to be substituted out] because I knew how fit she was. And so I kept her on the pitch. And then she cried, and my fellow coach had to step in."
 
"So we both mature," Victor continued, "and it's very very easy to communicate, because we understand the game in the same eyes."
 
When Imani was nine years old she began playing on her father's club team Rapid Fire Elite, based in Montclair, New Jersey.
 
"My dad and I played similar positions when I was younger," Imani said. "I see the field and the different options almost in his eyes — he would ask 'did you see that next next option? Did you prepare for that next obstacle?'"
 
Now after playing field hockey for over a decade, Imani has begun to view the game as a metaphor for approaching life deliberately and purposefully.
 
"[Field hockey] lets me slow down," Imani said. A premed student and neuroscience major, Imani said knowing she will have a practice at 4:30 p.m. each day allows her to "reset and refocus."
 
"At the end of the day, everyone needs a break," Imani said. "Field hockey has become a natural thing to me — I'm going out there and letting my body feel free."
 
An Olympic Past
 
In 1988, Victor was chosen to play on Kenya's national team in the Seoul summer Olympics.
 
"In Kenya, [field hockey] is considered an amateur sport," Ochieng said. "If you're selected to play for your country, you're a hero. But you're only a hero when the people are watching you on TV, as soon as you're walking down the street, you're just an ordinary guy."
 
As a result of that cultural disassociation with sports fame, Ochieng says he doesn't often think back on those days of international competition.
 
"I don't really remember that big game or the Olympics," Ochieng said. "But I have friends [in the US] who talk about goals they scored in highschool. It's a cultural difference."
 
Whether his memories are of Olympic trials or backyard scrimmages, Ochieng says the people, not the goals, stick with him
 
"I think of the social part of the game, and my friendships for life," he said.
 
Indeed, after many decades on the pitch, Ochieng continues to play, fueling that same sense of freedom, he said.
 
"Field hockey is medicine," Ochieng affirmed. "When I'm boxed in [to my engineering work] and overwhelmed in my own head, I need field hockey to come back to life."
 
These days, Ochieng, who received his PhD in Transportation System Modeling from the City University of New York, works as technical manager for Traffic Databank, a transportation engineering firm.
 
He continues to coach (with Ramapo College in New Jersey and his club team) and play competitively with the Big Apple Flickers in New York City, according to his Ramapo College biography.
 
"If you can call it competitive," he laughed. "All the old guys in the over 40s over 50s leagues gang up to play together. You pass the ball one yard away, and [the player] watches it go by and asks, 'was that for me?'"
 
Given any level of competition though, Ochieng continues to love the game.
 
"That's my joy," he said.
 
Similar to Imani, Victor is filled with metaphors for the game and its resounding consistency in his life.
 
"If something is really challenging, it's because I didn't prepare enough or practice enough," Victor said. These days, challenges for the engineer might be missing a client's deadline, but he still thinks through a field hockey lens.

"Why didn't I score that goal or make that pass when I had the chance? I don't analyze myself alone, I look at the team, and I think 'what was my role, what can I do better?'"
 
Failure and loss are natural and important steps to growth, Ochieng recognized.
 
"Did you lose doing your best?" he asks himself.
 
Giving Back
 
"For the rest of the world," Victor said, "hockey is the number two most popular team sport after soccer, so I was completely shocked when I got [to the US] in '98. Here, if you want to play a men's sport, you have to be macho and tackle and hit someone hard."
 
Yet, with the gender disparity in access to organized sports in Kenya, Victor said he aims to increase access for young women.
 
"I hope to help another generation as we redevelop the sport," Victor said. "There's a big effort to revamp the game among young girls in highschool, because that [support] was never there."
 
Victor has helped create an organization, Sliders Field Hockey, to provide funding for women's field hockey in Kenya. Imani's mother and her sisters have also played with this club, Imani said.
 
"We help them get jobs when they play in high school or college," Victor said. "The government doesn't support women's sports that much, so we try to organize to buy hockey sticks or meals."
 
Watching her father's work as a coach all her life, Imani said she's been inspired to take on a coaching role as well, and she assists at her former club, Rapid Fire Elite.
 
"To be a coach that people look back on as someone who made a difference in their life is something I hope to have one day," Imani said. "So many people text me on my dad's birthday to pass along good wishes, whether they're playing these days on an intramural team or the Women's National Team."
 
As for her aspirations on the field, Imani said she had considered playing Division 1 field hockey, but the pandemic made recruiting difficult.
 
"I know a lot of people in my year got the short end of the stick because many school's had returning 5th years," Imani said.
 
"At first, I was down on myself because I knew I could be competing at that level," Imani said. "But I don't regret my decision — I'm at such a competitive academic school while competing in such a competitive league. I know my friends in D1 feel a lot of pressure on their time with academic work and practices."
 
Of her and her teammates, Imani said, "We came to this school, and we made a difference at this school."
 
"My dad's [uniform number] was always #2 in his traveling days, and I was always #2 during my club years, and I am very proud to be able to continue on what he—" Imani stopped.
 
"Don't cry," Victor said as Imani wiped her eyes.
 
"I'm trying not to!" she laughed. "You can talk now."
 
"How can I go, after you've taken all the words?" Victor asked.