Thomas Breen photo
The state championship-winning boys and girls track teams from Hillhouse High School.
Nyia White has been running track since she was 6 years old. But the 15-year-old Hillhouse High School freshman decided only earlier this year to really get serious about competitive running, as she saw her older classmates running and winning track meet after track meet.
Now White is a key member of a state championship-winning high school track team.
On Thursday morning, White joined her nine fellow teammates on Hillhouse’s Girls Outdoor Track & Field Team along with the ten members of the high school’s Boys Outdoor Track & Field Team for a celebration on the second floor of City Hall in honor of the two teams’ recent state championships.
The girls track team won the Class M state championship during a May competition in New Britain. The boys team won the state title for Class MM. Connecticut’s high school athletics are classified by size, with M and MM referring to track programs at mid-size high schools.
The boys team also placed first in the 800 meter sprint medley and the 1600 meter sprint medley at the national championships in Greensboro, N.C.
Mayor Toni Harp.
“We celebrate success in sports and go out of our way to acknowledge these state championships,” Mayor Toni Harp said during a City Hall ceremony in which each track team member received a plaque commemorating their teams’ success, “because they signify excellence, and excellence is exactly what we want for all of our students enrolled in New Haven Public Schools.”
She said Hillhouse High School has now earned more than two dozen state championships across a range of sports, which, she said, is more any other high school in Connecticut.
Schools Superintendent Carol Birks said she is so proud to celebrate state and national championship winning teams just three months into her tenure as the head of the public school system.
“I’m looking forward to seeing you running in the Olympics,” she said. “We’re speaking that into your lives right now.”
Schools Superintendent Carol Birks with Hillhouse track star Manasseh Bekele.
She called up Manasseh Bekele, one of the members of the boys team, who showed off his four state championship rings, all worn on his left hand. Bekele said that, in addition to his track prowess, he is likely going to receive a full, four-year scholarship to attend college in Florida next year. Birks praised him and his teammates for as evidence that “New Haven has the best and brightest.”
Hillhouse track coaches Gary and Michelle Moore.
Girls track team coach Gary Moore and boys coach Michelle Moore, who are husband and wife and have both worked at Hillhouse for over 20 years, praised their student athletes and assistant coaches for working together to bring home the state championships.
“We’re very proud of you, of what you were able to accomplish this year,” Gary told the group.
After the ceremony, the two team decamped to a second-floor meeting room for pizza and soda.
Nyia White (right) with Kiera Payne and De’Janay Davis.
White, sitting alongside her teammates Kiera Payne and De’Janay Davis, said the transition from middle school to high school track has been a difficult one, but now she feels more driven and more competitive in her running than ever before.
White competes in five categories for Hillhouse’s track team: the 4 x 400 meter relay, the 800 meter outdoors, the 600 meter outdoors, the 300 meter indoors, and the 200 meter indoors.
“I saw all these older girls running track and winning,” she said. “I ran because I wanted to join the team.”
The members of the Girls Outdoor Track & Field Team are Nyimah Ambrose, Jada Boyd, Nyia White, De’Janay Davis, Jalynn McCown, Enyla Williams, Leah Moore, Kiera Payne, Emani Williams, Ayesha Nelson.
The members of the Boys Outdoor Track & Field Team are Manasseh Bekele, Ryan Martinez, Deshaune Poole, Neal Eley, Dale Thompson, Talib McBride, Naszier Torrence Robinson.
Click on the Facebook Live video below to watch the full press conference.
Congratulations Deshaune Poole and Neal Eley and the rest of the #HouseFam for continuing the legacy of excellence in Tack and Field for the City of New Haven. Your coaches presented you with a challenge and you have exceeded expectations. Now, your only competition is yourselves.
You have experienced the sweet taste of victory, and this is a milestone in a lifelong journey of challenges. You know what it means to sweat and experience the pain of training so that you can enjoy the fruits of your labor. Transfer lessons learned on the Tracks and Fields into the fabric of your daily lives and you will realize that the sky is not the limit....there are no limits; unless you limit yourselves.
Godspeed,
Seth
Cross '94