“It’s a great day for Clarkston sports,” Athletic Director Dan Fife said, as three senior athletes signed letters of intent at Division I universities.
Families and friends gathered in the Clarkston High School media center Wednesday, Nov. 12, the national date for high school athletes to commit to their scholarship agreements.
Colleen Mead is accepting a full athletic scholarship to play tennis at Western Michigan University, and Fife said it is the first time in at least recent memory for a Clarkston student to receive a full tennis scholarship.
“Western has everything I was looking for in a college, both academically and a tennis team and coach,” Mead said, with about four other schools under consideration before she made her choice.
A highlight this year was Mead’s qualification for the Michigan High School Athletic Association tennis finals, where she placed third in singles competition.
“The atmosphere was just amazing,” she said. “It’s supposed to be a quiet sport, but they were screaming after every point.”
At Western, Mead plans to major in accounting and minor in criminal justice. She hopes to take advantage of both career fields, working for an accounting firm for a couple years then transferring to the FBI.
Aaron Powell and Sam Palace both accepted baseball scholarships, Powell to Eastern Michigan University and Palace to Kent State University in Ohio.
Powell toured the Ypsilanti campus in mid-September. He will play first base and pitch for the Eagles.
“I really like their campus and their criminal justice program,” he said. “They have a really good baseball team. They asked me to play and said I’d be playing in my freshman year.”
Powell said other schools were possibilities, but “Eastern stepped forward.”
With a criminal justice major, Powell also aspires to a career with an agency such as the FBI or CIA.
“I like that field. It’s not the same thing every day. It changes every day, and that’s what I like.”
A catcher, Palace said he is confident in his choice.
“The biggest reason is I like the coaching staff over at Kent State,” he said. “They gave me a good offer, and I took it.”
Palace has yet to choose a field of study, but he is interested in something along the line of physical therapy as a career.
Both Palace and Powell also played varsity football, but both believe baseball is a better choice for college, especially because of the potential injury factor.
“It doesn’t beat down your body as much, and I just kind of enjoy it a little better,” Powell said.
“I’ll have a longer career, and I think I’m a little better in baseball,” Palace said.
That doesn’t mean the football memories will fade.
“This was my favorite year” in football, Palace said. “Our coaches all believed in us. There was never any fighting on or off the field between the team. We were always great friends with each other.”