Idle time tends to be unproductive time for Makelle Skelton, so the Northrop star stays busy – real busy – on the track. One of the more versatile girls track athletes, the senior has proved her value again and again for the No.The season opener for the Bishop Luers girls soccer team resulted in a 5-0 loss to Carroll. Not exactly the greatest beginning for the Knights and star forward Mayson Whitman. As it turned out, it was the start of something great for the senior and the Class A semistate-bound Knights.
The game marked the return for Whitman, the team’s leading scorer with 28 goals and nine assists, after breaking her ankle during travel soccer in April and having to spend most of the summer in a boot and a cast.
“It was so easy to get back, the adrenaline took over, and I was just doing the game I loved,” Whitman said of that Aug. 14 match.
And the run isn’t over yet as Luers (13-5) will face host Argos (13-5-2) at noon Saturday in a semistate semifinal.
Whitman broke her ankle in three places and tore ligaments during a game with a Fort Wayne Sport Club team and was out of soccer for four months.
“They said it was going to be six months, but I came back in four,” she said.
Counting the opening loss to the Chargers, the Knights lost four of their first five matches to start the season but have now won eight straight. Luers beat Oak Hill 9-1 in last week’s regional, with Whitman getting four goals and an assist.
“It is the girls who make me look good,” said Whitman, an IPFW recruit. “I feel bad because I get all the recognition because the other girls are working just as hard. It’s really all them.”
Despite her humility, Whitman’s presence to the team is big after earning All-SAC and All-District honors three of the four years with the Luers program.
“Mayson’s skills on the ball are very important to our team,” Luers coach Kevin Lewis said.
“Her ability to hold the ball when necessary, pass the ball when in the box to find another player or to just outright score goals has been the reason we have gone so deep.”
Whitman credits the conditioning of the team, which started with just running workouts June 15, as a key component in making the deep postseason run.
“We come from a smaller school than a lot of the teams we are playing against, and we don’t have as much of a selection,” Whitman said. “At tryouts, we don’t even cut anyone. It comes down to the skill and dedication because every girl out there wants to be there. We don’t have a lot of subs, and we are going to be really, really tired, but we will leave it all on the field, I promise you that.”
