Pullman track community finds itself mourning
Pullman High graduate and former state champ killed by
ex-boyfriend, police say
By Dale Grummert, Lewiston Tribune Oct 24, 2018
PULLMAN - For Lauren McCluskey's former track and field
coaches in Pullman, there wasn't much in the coaching manuals Tuesday to help them
steer a course.
"I spend the days working with young people,
right?" former Pullman High track coach Kristen Walker said by phone
Tuesday night. "As a parent of a college student and somebody who has
spent their life working with them, we all have the hopes and dreams, but we
also have the concerns - of them navigating the world once they're on their
own."
McCluskey, a multi-event track athlete at the University of
Utah, was shot and killed by an ex-boyfriend Monday night in Salt Lake City,
authorities said. Her body was found in a car near campus student housing, and
her attacker killed himself overnight in a church, police said.
Pullman coaches learned the news Tuesday morning and spent
much of the day communicating with McCluskey's former teammates.
"No parent, no family, no friend should have to hear
that news," said Walker, who now teaches in Auburn, Wash. "I have my
own grief and sadness. It's sadness for the loss and it's sadness for all of
her teammates and friends that I have watched posting things on social media
and taken calls from and texted with today - that at a relatively young age
they have to grapple with such a horrific crime. And that makes them feel
vulnerable as well as grieving."
One of McCluskey's former Pullman High teammates, Amelia
Galloway, wrote a Facebook post that expressed her grief and made a plea for
gun-policy reform.
"I hesitate to get political because I don't want to
diminish the tragedy of what has occurred," Galloway wrote. "My
thoughts and prayers are with the McCluskey family. But I'm sick of hearing
about shootings like this and people doing nothing about them except for
gossiping about it on social media until they slowly forget it ever
happened."
McCluskey and Galloway were the only freshman girls to make
the Pullman High varsity track team in 2012, Galloway recalled in the post.
"She was such a sweet, hard-working person," she
wrote. "I never knew a more accomplished athlete as well as a kind, humble
soul. She will be greatly missed and it hurts me that her life was cut
short."
To cap that freshman season, McCluskey won the girls' 2A
shot put at the Washington state large-school track meet. As her career
progressed she moved toward multi-events, and she ranks 10th all-time for Utah
in the pentathlon.
"Lauren had an exceptional ability to just be extremely
disciplined in everything she did," Walker said. "She just navigated,
time-managed and organized."
Angel Nkwonta, another former Pullman teammate, said by
phone Tuesday night that she was "still in shock - to know and been
friends with someone and have something so horrific happen to them.
"She was just to sweet - quiet," said Nkwonta, a
weight-thrower for the University of Washington. "She was, like, happy all
the time. She was extremely dedicated, so driven. When she wanted something,
she would go get it."
Mike Hinz, longtime coach at Pullman High and for the
Pullman Comets summer track program, coached McCluskey for a decade as she won
19 All-America honors for high placings at USA Track and Field competitions.
"It was a difficult day, because not only did I go
through the initial shock," Hinz said Tuesday night, "but there was
sort of a recurrent grieving as her former Pullman teammates all weighed in
during the course of the day."
Hinz said McCluskey "tended to be somewhat
perfectionistic, which is not always a good thing. But one thing was, she was very
diligent and therefore a master of technique. When that was combined with her
natural talents, that was a good combination.
"She was a very hard worker and didn't often allow
herself to be anything but serious," he said. "Those who knew her
would know she was not given to frivolity, but the few times when she would
relax and get a little away from that seriousness was when she was on a relay
team ... as if by virtue of that team effort she could relax enough to allow an
expression of joy. And those were the times I remember that I felt the best for
her."
Also, see:
