There can’t be many things better than spending your first post-graduate year from high school by living in Florida. Double that idea with having sports as your full-time job for the school year and it becomes even more intriguing for any student-athlete.

For Liberty graduate (2016) Kaylin West, you can say, she was living the dream this past year.

West officially received a scholarship to Coastal Carolina recently to become apart of their women’s basketball program after spending the past season eating and breathing basketball at IMG Academy, located in Brandenton, Fl.

IMG is known for being the top sports academy in the country, originally starting out as a boarding school for tennis players in 1978 and growing to become the elite sports academy for high school student-athletes.

West’s path to IMG started with her ambition of playing D-I college basketball following her senior year at Liberty. She could have played at West Chester, but that was Division-II. She could have waited a year and got a full ride to Fairliegh Dickinson, but spending a year taking classes at community college and training on her own, compared to attending IMG became a no-brainer.

“I didn’t even know what IMG was when my dad first told me about it,” said West. “Once I started telling people about IMG, their eyes would light up and ask ‘the IMG?’ I knew it was something I had to do when I saw the look on people’s faces when I told them I had the opportunity to come here.”

West’s IMG team included players from all over the country, as well as international students, as they played a full JUCO schedule this past season. Her typical days consisted of shooting, weight lifting and a two-hour practice all before noon, capping off afternoon’s with another two-hour practice or a shooting session.

“I could have taken classes while I was here, but I just wanted to focus solely on basketball,” she said. “I was in the gym from 9 a.m.-to-4 p.m. when I got here in the fall and when preseason began, we started at 6 a.m. I really just played basketball for a full-year. I had to come here knowing all the resources they had.”

West averaged 13 points, eight rebounds and four assists this past season at IMG and will now move to play in the Big South Conference.

“Playing against some of the best JUCO players in the country, helped me grow so much as a player and person,” she said. “We have the best training facilities here, the coaches are outstanding and everyone here is just amazing. I never would be the player I am today without being here.”

West’s family lineage has been a stoic one in the Lehigh Valley and at Liberty, as her father Warren, is Liberty’s all-time points leader in basketball. Her mother, Jamie, was an all-conference basketball player at Easton, and her brother, Jarrod, was part of Liberty’s 2006 4A state championship football team. He later went on to play at Syracuse and spent training camp stints with the Pittsburgh Steelers, New York Jets and Tennessee Titans.

“I’ve always had doubters because of my name,” said West. “I always heard that I was only in places because of my family and not because of what I did. People doubted that I could survive at IMG. To now receive this scholarship, it lets me breathe and enjoy it.”