WHS trio to run,

vault into college
By Steve Behr

Watauga’s track and field teams have sent plenty of student-athletes to colleges on athletic scholarships. The class of 2009 won’t be any different.

Three Pioneers will continue running track and cross country in college next year. Kristina Kanagy will run cross country at Liberty, Thomas McDonough will run at UNC Pembroke and Taylor Cook will pole vault at Gardner-Webb.

Kanagy, who just started running cross country last season when her father signed her up — without her knowledge — said she had some help when choosing Liberty over Appalachian State.

“I felt like that’s where God wanted me to go,” Kanagy said. “It was tough to choose between Liberty and Appalachian. It doesn’t matter to me if it’s a Christian school or not. It just felt like it was the right school for me at the time.”

Kanagy finished 10th in the state 4-A cross country meet held at Tanglewood Park in Winston-Salem, which earned her All-State honors. She is balancing two sports this spring, running distance races for Watauga’s track team and also playing lacrosse. She won’t get to play lacrosse at Liberty, but she is looking forward to running track and cross country for the Flames.

“It is amazing,” Kanagy said of the Liberty program. “I like the coach and the girls on the team are really welcoming.”

Kanagy said she will likely major in exercise science and using her degree to possibly become a physical therapist.

It all started when Kanagy’s dad was in North Carolina while Kanagy was in Ohio. He signed her up to run cross country before her junior year to keep her in shape for lacrosse.

“My dad was here working and signed me up for cross country behind my back to keep me in shape for lacrosse,” Kanagy said. “It was lucky time.”

Cook follows the path paved by Sallie Gurganus, who signed to do the pole vault at South Carolina three years ago, and Julie Ward, who vaults at Appalachian State. Already known as a school that has plenty of distance runners, Watauga is also gaining a reputation as being a power in the pole vault.

Cook, who has verbally committed to Gardner-Webb, is the defending 4-A state champion in the outdoor pole vault, winning with a vault of 11-feet even. She also finished second in the indoor meet this season and is looking forward to winning her second straight state championship this spring.

“We’ve had a lot of good girls come out of here, and (pole vault coach) Daniel (Isaacs) has been coaching as long as that tradition has lasted,” Cook said. “We’ve had Sallie who came in and set state records and Julie, who did really well. They were seniors when I started high school, and they really helped me out and gave me something to look up to. I try my very best to hold myself up to the expectations they’ve created in the pole vault.”

Cook was a gymnast earlier in her life, which she credits for helping her adjust to the athleticism needed to do the pole vault event. Proper technique is critical when vaulting, which is also true when it comes to doing well in gymnastics.

“I got to high school and (gymnastics) was way too much of a time commitment,” Cook said. “I had done some track in middle school, but when I got to high school, Sallie was up here and she had done some gymnastics and I saw how successful she was at pole vault, so I gave it a try and it went very well.”

Gardner-Webb can consider itself lucky that it is getting Cook. She said in the beginning, Gardner-Webb, located in Boiling Springs near Shelby, was not in the picture. A call from the coach followed by a visit in November helped sell her on the school.

“It was one of those no-name schools that I never thought I’d be going to,” Cook said. “Their coach contacted me back in the fall and said they were interested and had a full-time vault coach, which a lot of schools don’t have. That was a good thing and it got me talking to them and what they offered.”

McDonough didn’t have to get into track and field, even if his father has been the coach at Watauga for a long time. McDonough settled on UNC Pembroke after getting a look at the campus.

“It’s just small and it’s what I need, and I feel that I can do well on the track and the cross country teams,” McDonough said. “I think I’ll be ready to run.”

McDonough runs the 400-meter dash and the 800-meter dash for the Watauga track team and also ran cross country. Thomas McDonough said his father would not have minded if Thomas had chosen to do something other than run for the Pioneers.

“My dad would have been fine if I chose not to,” Thomas McDonough said. “I always liked running and it’s always been a part of me and that helped,but I was never forced into anything. It’s why I like it so much, because I’m doing it on my own.”

McDonough got into running early well before the high school level.

“The first time I started running seriously was in third grade when I got third in the mile run in P.E.,” he said. “I never knew I could run fast before that. I was into football before that.”

McDonough said he teammates have helped take the pressure off of being the coach’s son.

“I felt them, but it’s never presented any extra pressure,” Thomas said of expectations of being Randy McDonough’s son. “I’ve always had a good team to pull me along. I’ve never really thought about my last name. I just go as hard as I can.”

He said one of the selling points for UNC Pembroke, a Division II school located in Lumberton, was that if offered his major.

“I want to study political science and they have that,” Thomas McDonough said. “I was also looking at Lees-McRae, but they didn’t have that.”

The goal for all of the Pioneers is to win the Northwestern 4-A Conference, which is disbanding as it is known at the end of the year.

“My personal expectation is I want every one to be unified as a team and I want to win conference in the last year of the current conference,” Thomas McDonough said. “We’ve always been dominant and I want to go out with a bang.”