May 07, 2008 10:38 am
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TERRELL LESTER
Sports Editor
Megan Fuller of Sequoyah is so good that a coach could be forgiven for wishing there were two of her.
She is one of the best all-purpose athletes in the county. Boys or girls.
She is a double gold-medal winner in track.
She is an all-star performer in basketball.
She is in goal for a state semifinalist soccer team.
She’s almost too good to be true.
If she were to affix names to the gold medals she brought home last weekend, Fuller might well call them “Hard Work” and “Dedication.”
She illustrated last weekend her penchant for perseverance.
On Friday, she recorded a gold-medal discus throw at the state meet at 1:30 in the afternoon, then tended goal in a winning performance in an overtime state playoff soccer quarterfinal at 5.
Back up again on Saturday morning, she went out and won her second track gold with the shot put.
And on Sunday, she went to her weekend job in Chelsea.
“I don’t do much,” she said with a smile. “All I do is my sports.
“I’ve always been the sports type.
“It keeps me out of trouble.”
And it keeps her name on the mailing lists of college recruiters.
She is a junior, but her skills have attracted the attention of college coaches in three sports.
She has been a two-year starter in basketball, leading Sequoyah is virtually all statistical categories.
She’s also a starter on an AAU touring summer basketball team comprised of marquee players from across the state.
Her shot-stopping abilities the last two seasons have carried Sequoyah to Top 10 rankings in Class 4A. This spring, she helped the Eagles reach the state semifinals after being in goal for eight shutouts.
In track, she was a discus silver-medalist as a sophomore before stepping up this spring to the gold-medal level.
She is, as coaches say, a natural athlete.
In track, she taught herself the rudiments of shot and discus.
She picked up the shot and the discus one day as a seventh-grader, then won first place the next day in her first competition.
“It just looked like fun,” she said.
She’s been collecting ribbons and medals ever since.
Only within the last year did Fuller seek outside help.
She connected with a speciality coach in Owasso, Caleb Seal, to improve her shot and discus skills.
She credits his work with fine-tuning her techniques and sharpening her mental approach.
She needed no help with her leadership qualities. Just as she is a natural athlete, so, too, is she a natural leader.
She did not have time, nor did she take time, on Friday to celebrate her gold-medal efforts on the track at the East Tulsa Sports Complex.
She went directly to the soccer match at Cascia Hall.
“I went out and high-fived my teammates, and said: ‘Listen, don’t let my win be the only win that we have today.’
“It was time that we stepped forward to do what we needed to do,” she said.
Fuller did her part. She turned back Cascia Hall, 2-1,and lifted Sequoyah into the semifinals.
Fuller hurled the discus 131 feet, 10 inches, a personal best, and won by more than four feet.
In the shot, her winning number of 41 feet, 5 inches was eight inches farther than the runnerup.
She professes to have no favorite sport among the sports in which she excels.
“It pretty much comes with the season,” she says. “It’s not like I can go out there and pick one over the other.”
But she has cleared the deck of other activities to spend more time with whatever sport is in season.
For years, Fuller has raised and shown pigs as a member of Future Farmers of America.
She is giving that up. She is turning her attention to following sports into college.
With high school basketball, soccer, track and AAU basketball, Fuller has developed an ability to prioritize her time.
It is that aptitude that belies her youth.
She is busy. She is focused. She is successful.
Coaches would like to see more like her.
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