SE: Morrow Takes Deep Dive into Rowing
Sep 30, 2021 | Rowing, Sports Extra
By: D. Scott Fritchen
Maya Morrow sits on a white leather couch on the second floor of the West Stadium Center on Monday evening. It is picture day for the Kansas State rowing team. One by one, everyone takes turns standing in front of a white backdrop to have their photograph taken. Everyone except for Maya.
Maya sits in her purple tank top with a Nike swoosh on the left side and a gray Powercat in the middle. She wears gray bottoms, studded earrings, black Nike slides, and a gray kerchief neatly covers the top of her head while braided black hair flows below her shoulders. Every once in a while, she looks down and fidgets with beautiful painted white nails. She smiles and looks up. Then she wipes the corner of her eye.
She has a story to tell.
Maya Morrow is a 22-year-old fifth-year senior from Kansas City, Kansas. She was an 18-year-old K-State freshman the first time she picked up an oar. She was unfamiliar with things like the "bow," "coxswain," "deck," "gate," "port," "starboard" and "stern," when she arrived in Manhattan. She was terrified. Her closest water activity? She once worked as a lifeguard.
Although Maya was a wonderful basketball and volleyball player, and a proven track athlete at Piper High School, she was unable to secure a Division I scholarship for any of these sports. But K-State rowing assistant coach Hanna Wiltfong, the Wildcats recruiting coordinator, attended some of Maya's basketball games. She saw something in Maya. She liked Maya's 5-foot-10 size, her athleticism and power, and grit. Finally, one day Wiltfong approached Maya during her junior year.
She asked Maya if she had ever thought about rowing.
• • •
Gregory Morrow, or "Big Greg" as everyone called him, had been a star basketball player. Maya was age 6 when he passed away. He left behind wife Karla, son Greg (16), and daughters Whitney (11) and Maya. Gregory and Karla each came from big families. There is a lot of love within the Morrows. Maya keeps going because of her mother, who she says is always in her corner. Maya also grew up wanting to be like her sister. They both competed in athletics and had similar builds. Now Greg is 32, Whitney is 27 and Maya is 22. Maya is the youngest child on either side of her family. She calls herself the baby. Maya leaves no doubt about her father's spot in her heart.
"Everything I do in rowing and in school," she says, "is for him."
She pauses and wipes the corner of her right eye.
"Today," she says, "would've been my parents' 35th wedding anniversary."
The family will gather for Maya's graduation at Bramlage Coliseum on December 11, 2021. She will earn a degree in sociology with an anthropology minor. She will listen for her family when her name is announced inside the arena. She knows that identifiable family yell and whistle, the kind that a son or daughter can hear six blocks away when the streetlights turn on. She hopes to find 20 tickets so all her family can watch her walk across the stage.
"Just knowing my dad is looking down on his baby girl, I know that he's proud of me and all that I've done," she says. "He probably would've never thought I'd be a rower in a thousand years. I know he would've loved it. He would've been at every race cheering as hard as he could.
"My dad would be so proud."
• • •
Maya sits on the couch and slowly motions with her right arm, hand straight and palm down. She says rowing is graceful and there are few things in life as beautiful as a glass lake on an autumn morning — smoooooth. She calls it a moment of bliss, when all eight girls are flowing together — "swing" is the rowing vernacular, "the hard-to-define feeling when near-perfect synchronization of motion occurs." Yeah, she feels that. She witnessed it all in motion when she witnessed the K-State rowing team in action for the first time at the 2016 Sunflower Showdown in Kansas City.
"I thought it was amazing," she says. "I am a Pisces, which is a water sign, so I decided right there that rowing was probably meant for me. Ironically, I also have 'r-o-w' in my last name. It's so graceful to move as one piece. In other sports, you don't have that connectiveness and not everybody can move all at one time. Everybody with other sports fits into a puzzle. In rowing, it's not a puzzle. Even though you have eight bodies, you're as one."
She pauses again.
"That's what's the most beautiful thing," she says, "all those bodies together as one."
It takes hours, days, and months of work to reach that bliss and make things smooth. Maya wants to emphasize that. It's up at 5:50 a.m., then to the Breidenthal Boathouse at Tuttle Creek Lake, then stretching for 30 minutes, then a short warmup, then practice. After practice, most of the team eats breakfast together. They bond. And that's important stuff. Maya says they're connecting, they're getting closer, and it feels great. Then they have weights, tutoring, and a workout at 4 p.m., focusing on endurance training inside the Intercollegiate Rowing Center on campus. Even when it gets down to 32 degrees, or even when the water is choppy, the team begs to row on the lake. "We've rowed in worse," they plead to head coach Patrick Sweeney. They like to layer up and wear thicker jackets, anything to get onto the lake, even if it's only for 45 minutes, because, as Maya puts it, "anything is better than being inside."
Last May, the rowing team finished third in the Big 12 Championship, which featured Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, and West Virginia, and K-State finished fifth overall among affiliate members, which featured Alabama and Tennessee. Maya was a part of the First Varsity Eight, which opened the competition with a time of 7:22.346 to finish sixth place and 17 seconds ahead of West Virginia. During the final push on Lake Walter E. Long in Austin, Texas, the rowers cheered each other on between breaths. It was a victory given the challenges that the team faced while training during the pandemic. It required patience with the COVID restrictions, and the team had to take advantage of any opportunities on the water.
"I remember my freshman year I watched a K-State rowing video and in the background played a song 'Surprise Yourself,'" Maya says. "How awesome it is that every day you have a chance to surprise yourself about what you can learn, and you're like, wow, and it's amazing to see. It feels great."
• • •
Maya is proud of the committees and organizations that she's joined since arriving at K-State. She's a member of K-State's Diversity and Inclusion initiative — "Athletic Director Gene Taylor has been great in seeking more diversity and inclusion within the university and has been great advocating for Black athletes, and that means a great deal to me," she says — along with the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee that promotes community involvement and fundraising efforts. She's a member of the Black Student Union and another group called "Positioning Athletes for Lifelong Success," in which members focus on important topics such as moving the needle forward to improve diversity and inclusion. It's a group that Maya calls "a home away from home."
"I've learned that our voice needs to be heard," she says. "Be bold in anything that you do. One of my primary qualities is being bold. I'm never afraid to speak my mind. Being bold in anything that I do has helped me in life. Being timid, shy, and afraid to speak up? No. Live with no regrets. Being bold can take you a lot of places."
She plans for her future place to be a behavioral health center as a family counselor.
"I've always had a psychiatrist because I have ADHD, so I was in a behavioral health clinic growing up," she says. "I just want to be an advocate for families who perhaps struggle with their children, and I want to be there for kids who might feel like their disability is a disability when in fact it's not. I really want to help them through that journey because sometimes it isn't easy. Having somebody in your corner is always big."
In December, Maya will walk across the stage with a diploma from K-State to show all the many people who've been in her corner throughout her life. She'll never forget Wiltfong, now a good friend, for taking a chance on her. She'll never forget her path and her friends who she made along the way. She'll leave K-State armed with the virtues of commitment, unity, improvement, and never giving up, which she learned after taking the biggest dive of her life in coming to Manhattan on scholarship to participate in a sport she once had never considered in her wildest dreams.
Yes, she'll walk across the stage at K-State graduation. Everyone will cheer and applaud. And only one thing will be on her mind.
Dad would be so proud.
Maya Morrow sits on a white leather couch on the second floor of the West Stadium Center on Monday evening. It is picture day for the Kansas State rowing team. One by one, everyone takes turns standing in front of a white backdrop to have their photograph taken. Everyone except for Maya.
Maya sits in her purple tank top with a Nike swoosh on the left side and a gray Powercat in the middle. She wears gray bottoms, studded earrings, black Nike slides, and a gray kerchief neatly covers the top of her head while braided black hair flows below her shoulders. Every once in a while, she looks down and fidgets with beautiful painted white nails. She smiles and looks up. Then she wipes the corner of her eye.
She has a story to tell.
Maya Morrow is a 22-year-old fifth-year senior from Kansas City, Kansas. She was an 18-year-old K-State freshman the first time she picked up an oar. She was unfamiliar with things like the "bow," "coxswain," "deck," "gate," "port," "starboard" and "stern," when she arrived in Manhattan. She was terrified. Her closest water activity? She once worked as a lifeguard.
Although Maya was a wonderful basketball and volleyball player, and a proven track athlete at Piper High School, she was unable to secure a Division I scholarship for any of these sports. But K-State rowing assistant coach Hanna Wiltfong, the Wildcats recruiting coordinator, attended some of Maya's basketball games. She saw something in Maya. She liked Maya's 5-foot-10 size, her athleticism and power, and grit. Finally, one day Wiltfong approached Maya during her junior year.
She asked Maya if she had ever thought about rowing.
• • •
Gregory Morrow, or "Big Greg" as everyone called him, had been a star basketball player. Maya was age 6 when he passed away. He left behind wife Karla, son Greg (16), and daughters Whitney (11) and Maya. Gregory and Karla each came from big families. There is a lot of love within the Morrows. Maya keeps going because of her mother, who she says is always in her corner. Maya also grew up wanting to be like her sister. They both competed in athletics and had similar builds. Now Greg is 32, Whitney is 27 and Maya is 22. Maya is the youngest child on either side of her family. She calls herself the baby. Maya leaves no doubt about her father's spot in her heart.
"Everything I do in rowing and in school," she says, "is for him."
She pauses and wipes the corner of her right eye.
"Today," she says, "would've been my parents' 35th wedding anniversary."
The family will gather for Maya's graduation at Bramlage Coliseum on December 11, 2021. She will earn a degree in sociology with an anthropology minor. She will listen for her family when her name is announced inside the arena. She knows that identifiable family yell and whistle, the kind that a son or daughter can hear six blocks away when the streetlights turn on. She hopes to find 20 tickets so all her family can watch her walk across the stage.
"Just knowing my dad is looking down on his baby girl, I know that he's proud of me and all that I've done," she says. "He probably would've never thought I'd be a rower in a thousand years. I know he would've loved it. He would've been at every race cheering as hard as he could.
"My dad would be so proud."
• • •
Maya sits on the couch and slowly motions with her right arm, hand straight and palm down. She says rowing is graceful and there are few things in life as beautiful as a glass lake on an autumn morning — smoooooth. She calls it a moment of bliss, when all eight girls are flowing together — "swing" is the rowing vernacular, "the hard-to-define feeling when near-perfect synchronization of motion occurs." Yeah, she feels that. She witnessed it all in motion when she witnessed the K-State rowing team in action for the first time at the 2016 Sunflower Showdown in Kansas City.
"I thought it was amazing," she says. "I am a Pisces, which is a water sign, so I decided right there that rowing was probably meant for me. Ironically, I also have 'r-o-w' in my last name. It's so graceful to move as one piece. In other sports, you don't have that connectiveness and not everybody can move all at one time. Everybody with other sports fits into a puzzle. In rowing, it's not a puzzle. Even though you have eight bodies, you're as one."
She pauses again.
"That's what's the most beautiful thing," she says, "all those bodies together as one."
It takes hours, days, and months of work to reach that bliss and make things smooth. Maya wants to emphasize that. It's up at 5:50 a.m., then to the Breidenthal Boathouse at Tuttle Creek Lake, then stretching for 30 minutes, then a short warmup, then practice. After practice, most of the team eats breakfast together. They bond. And that's important stuff. Maya says they're connecting, they're getting closer, and it feels great. Then they have weights, tutoring, and a workout at 4 p.m., focusing on endurance training inside the Intercollegiate Rowing Center on campus. Even when it gets down to 32 degrees, or even when the water is choppy, the team begs to row on the lake. "We've rowed in worse," they plead to head coach Patrick Sweeney. They like to layer up and wear thicker jackets, anything to get onto the lake, even if it's only for 45 minutes, because, as Maya puts it, "anything is better than being inside."
Last May, the rowing team finished third in the Big 12 Championship, which featured Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, and West Virginia, and K-State finished fifth overall among affiliate members, which featured Alabama and Tennessee. Maya was a part of the First Varsity Eight, which opened the competition with a time of 7:22.346 to finish sixth place and 17 seconds ahead of West Virginia. During the final push on Lake Walter E. Long in Austin, Texas, the rowers cheered each other on between breaths. It was a victory given the challenges that the team faced while training during the pandemic. It required patience with the COVID restrictions, and the team had to take advantage of any opportunities on the water.
"I remember my freshman year I watched a K-State rowing video and in the background played a song 'Surprise Yourself,'" Maya says. "How awesome it is that every day you have a chance to surprise yourself about what you can learn, and you're like, wow, and it's amazing to see. It feels great."
• • •
Maya is proud of the committees and organizations that she's joined since arriving at K-State. She's a member of K-State's Diversity and Inclusion initiative — "Athletic Director Gene Taylor has been great in seeking more diversity and inclusion within the university and has been great advocating for Black athletes, and that means a great deal to me," she says — along with the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee that promotes community involvement and fundraising efforts. She's a member of the Black Student Union and another group called "Positioning Athletes for Lifelong Success," in which members focus on important topics such as moving the needle forward to improve diversity and inclusion. It's a group that Maya calls "a home away from home."
"I've learned that our voice needs to be heard," she says. "Be bold in anything that you do. One of my primary qualities is being bold. I'm never afraid to speak my mind. Being bold in anything that I do has helped me in life. Being timid, shy, and afraid to speak up? No. Live with no regrets. Being bold can take you a lot of places."
She plans for her future place to be a behavioral health center as a family counselor.
"I've always had a psychiatrist because I have ADHD, so I was in a behavioral health clinic growing up," she says. "I just want to be an advocate for families who perhaps struggle with their children, and I want to be there for kids who might feel like their disability is a disability when in fact it's not. I really want to help them through that journey because sometimes it isn't easy. Having somebody in your corner is always big."
In December, Maya will walk across the stage with a diploma from K-State to show all the many people who've been in her corner throughout her life. She'll never forget Wiltfong, now a good friend, for taking a chance on her. She'll never forget her path and her friends who she made along the way. She'll leave K-State armed with the virtues of commitment, unity, improvement, and never giving up, which she learned after taking the biggest dive of her life in coming to Manhattan on scholarship to participate in a sport she once had never considered in her wildest dreams.
Yes, she'll walk across the stage at K-State graduation. Everyone will cheer and applaud. And only one thing will be on her mind.
Dad would be so proud.
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/ Rowing
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