The Pingry School

But ask about her best memory as a student athlete, and her voice alights as she takes herself back to Pingry’s softball field, her senior year. It was May 20, 2016 when the team clinched the Prep A State Championship, and Katie amassed her 1,000th high school strikeout. “We weren’t the most successful team on campus, but that day, a group of girls from so many different backgrounds—some had never played softball before joining the team—came together for that one goal. We had all worked so hard for the Prep title , and we did it. We made something awesome happen.” She recalls running up to her catcher and good friend, Amanda Van Orden ’17, and hugging, and exchanging an awestruck look with Coach Carver. They, too, embraced. “I was so happy to get that win for him,” she says.

The Fighting Irish are her new family, but Big Blue memories are never far away for Katie. The pre-med major credits Pingry for preparing her to balance the rigors of Division I softball with demanding coursework. “I wouldn’t be able to be pre-med and a softball player if I didn’t have Pingry, if I hadn’t learned how to prioritize, manage my time, all these integral skills that I needed to succeed. I am most grateful for that.”

Recipient of the 2016 Tom Boyer Football Award and a Skyland Conference Scholar Athlete, Michael says when he was little, he thought basketball was his calling. But then he started Pingry in Grade 5, joined the Middle School football teams in Grades 7 and 8, and hasn’t stopped playing since. Memories of his senior-year Homecoming game—“my best game at Pingry”—and Friday Night Lights remain vivid for him. “I was really stressed out that whole game. I thought ‘I have to win.’ I didn’t want my last Friday Night Lights game to be a loss,” he recalls. “I couldn’t relax the whole game. But then I had a punt return that Coach Shilts later called the play of the year. After that, I could relax.”

Despite playing on—and captaining—a football team that fought hard but fell short of a winning record, Michael cherished the experience, and brought lessons learned with him to Middlebury. “It really taught me how to compete,” he explains. “We weren’t winning a lot but I learned to get into that mental state and keep going even when it’s not going your way. That transfers into life.”

Come late August, he will say goodbye to Pingry and his old teammates, and return to Vermont. He’s looking forward to his sophomore year. “It’s cool to be a college athlete. It’s something I have always dreamed of. But I will always remember the friends I made at Pingry, the connections with the guys on the team. The high school experience is really unique.”

"It's no secret that you have a lot of work at Pingry and you have as much if not more in college, so time management is extremely important," he says. "I think the pressures on and off the field at Pingry helped prepare me for life now and what it takes to be as successful as I can regardless of the situation."

During his first Macalester's football season, he was 3-of-6 in field goal attempts and made 22 out of 27 PATs. His senior year, he ranked second in the Midwest Conference in field goals, seventh in total points, and tied the school record with four field goals in a single game (the fourth was a go-ahead with less than five minutes left in the game). At one point, he ranked fifth among Division III colleges and universities in the country in field goals per game. He also played for the school's club ice hockey team, sang with their coed a cappella group—the ChroMACtics—and served as a campus tour guide.

An economics major, he is considering work in finance or graduate school. Because he transitioned from soccer to football he has a year of eligibility left, so playing a third year of football may be on the horizon.

As a freshman, he joined the cross country team. When he decided to try track his sophomore year, competing in the 3200-meter (2 miles) run, he was pretty sure his strong suit was as a distance runner, and that’s just what he focused on. Until, that is, Boys’ Varsity Cross Country and Track Coach Matt Horesta had him try the 800, a grueling, nearly all-out sprint for half a mile. Coach Horesta’s instincts were right. His junior year, Justin placed third in the event in the state group meet (he was seeded seventh), qualifying for the New Jersey Meet of Champions, and catching the eye of college coaches. By his senior year, he clinched second at the state group championship in a meet-record time, and qualified for the prestigious Emerging Elite 800-meter run at New Balance Nationals, where he ran 1:54.66, the second-fastest time in Pingry’s history.

“That was a big moment for me,” he recalls, four years later. “Coach Horesta definitely helped me to develop in an event I hadn’t before considered. I began talking with college coaches, and the door really opened for me in terms of being able to compete on a collegiate level.” (He is also quick to credit his other Pingry track & field coaches and mentors, Tom Cladek, Mark Sepkowski, and Gerry Vanasse.)

The accolades piled up from there. As a freshman at Williams, he was a member of their 4x800 NESCAC Championship team, a team that went on, the following week, to win Division III New England’s. His achievements earned him First Team All-NESCAC and All-New England honors. And that was just his freshman year.

Looking back at his Pingry athletic experiences, however, the big meets and big honors aren’t what stand out for him. “The days leading up to an important race—talking to Coach about my goals—were almost more memorable than the race itself,” he says. “That’s when the training is done, you know you’ve put in all the hard work, and Coach Horesta was always confident that I could succeed. He taught us that it’s not a question of whether you can, but whether you will.”

And when Justin is home during college breaks, he meets with Coach Horesta and his old teammates for dinner, just to talk, once again.