Nicole Heavirland: Athlete of the Week

Describing someone as special as Nicole Heavirland isn’t easy. Asking people around campus to do so in a word returned athletic, as the most popular response. (There’s a reason she was voted Most Athletic Girl, not to mention Most Likely to go to the Olympics and runner-up to Most Likely to be on the Cover of Sports Illustrated in The Exonian’s 2014 senior superlatives.) Yet, such a common and undefined term barely begins to do her justice. Talented and gifted both sound better, but each ignores the effort it takes to capitalize on natural skill and advance to the next levels of competition. Ultimately, Heavirland’s closest friends know her best:Dedicated. Diligent. Driven. Motivated. Tireless. Passionate. Perfect.As with every sports legend, there’s an original inspiration in the story; for Heavirland, it was her father, who had a basketball in her fingers before she can remember. Though her sizable hands gave her a strong push towards basketball, you’d be hard-pressed to find a sport Heavirland hasn’t played: soccer, track, volleyball, tackle football, rugby, wrestling. Without having any prior experience, she tried out for and made girls’ varsity lacrosse at PEA just last spring (though she opted to play in a spring basketball league instead). The exception?“I hate swimming,” Heavirland said. So you can relax for now, Missy Franklin. But, if Nicole decides she belongs in a pool, watch out.“My sister has always been very competitive,” Ryan Heavirland, Nicole’s twin and fellow senior at the Academy, said. “I stopped playing one-on-one basketball with her because she would always throw elbows. She also used to play tackle football with us in fourth and fifth grade, and in practice one time, she broke a kid’s collarbone. She was our starting running back both years.”This wasn’t Nicole’s only experience playing with and showing up boys. Her other main sport, rugby, did not easily present her with the chance to play for a girls team, especially in her hometown of Whitefish, Montana. Despite the hurdles, she proceeded to participate in tournaments throughout the year, practicing and playing with boys at venues up to two hours away.Eventually, Heavirland joined a girls team and had the opportunity to train at special facilities in Chula Vista, CA. This past summer, she received the opportunity to play for the Women’s Junior All-American U20 rugby team, which travelled to England to compete in the Women’s Nation Cup. In preparing for the team, Heavirland went through strenuous training that included several-hour workouts seven days a week. And during that time, she still managed to spend an hour shooting hoops. Though the monetary cost of the team was also high, Heavirland received more than the required $2400 from online donations, including $1000 directly from Phillips Exeter, and managed to play for her country overseas.While she could most clearly see herself playing rugby as a career sport, basketball remains Heavirland’s premier venture at Exeter. After starting on travel teams in the eighth grade, she played AAU and high school basketball for three years in Montana before applying to Exeter with her brother.“Ryan, my twin, went to a football camp back East, and got interested in applying to prep schools,” she said. “It would have been my senior year, and I didn’t want to come here at first.”Upon meeting people at Exeter, however, she became more pleased with the decision to leave Montana and repeat her junior year. To aid the transition, she was also fortunate enough to have several girls from the basketball team in her dorm. This year, there are even more. “Six girls from the basketball team are in Amen,” she said. “I wish we could have a dorm all together.”Nicole has also impacted everyone in her dorm as much as they have impacted her. “Knowing Nicole as more than just a teammate, I can honestly say she has one of the best hearts of anyone I’ve met,” fellow Amen senior Nina Meyers said. “When it comes to her friends and family, she goes the extra mile. There’s nothing more reassuring than knowing that someone has your back all the time. She has that air about her that makes everyone love her. I don’t know how she does it. It’s a gift.”“Nicole has also become a part of our family,” PEA girls’ basketball coach Johnny Griffith said. “My daughters look up to and admire her and want to be like her. They talk about her all the time. When my eight-year old was working on her spelling homework and was asked to write a sentence using the word "tough," she asked my wife how to spell Montana (our nickname for Nicole). The sentence she wrote: ‘Montana is the toughest person I know.’”Following a season in which girls’ varsity basketball limped to a 4-17 record, the team needed a new spark. Nicole was more than up to the job. The 5’7” guard averaged 16.5 points, 2.1 assists, and 2.7 steals, while also shooting 82 percent from the free throw line. Halfway through the season, the girls also decided they needed another captain, so they voted Heavirland in.“She’s serious in practice and can keep our focus while still keeping us comfortable,” teammate Courtney Henrich ‘15 said. “She’s not a vocal leader, but she definitely leads by example. She does whatever the team needs her to do and can adjust to the other team to be the most effective player she can be.”“She does everything you ask her to do without questioning,” Griffith said. “She might come back later and ask about reasons or wonder about why we did something or chose to do something in a particular way, but, in the moment, when she's asked to do something, she does it. ‘Okay, coach’ is her typical response. Not only that, she also understands what you ask her to do on the court and gets it the first time.”Heavirland’s transition to Exeter basketball didn’t come entirely free of wrinkles. After losing their main ball handler, the girls looked to Heavirland to run point for the team, a change from her traditional position of shooting guard. As with everything else, she took it in stride and continued to work as hard as she could in practice to improve. By the end of the season, she was rewarded, receiving the team’s MVP award.“We call her Nicole ‘One More’ Heavirland,” Henrich said. “No matter what the drill is, she needs to add in one more rep at the end.”Especially during this winter term, finding Heavirland doesn’t require extensive effort. Between practice and personal workouts, she spends an estimated 20 hours a week in the gym. “I like the feeling I get after working out,” Heavirland said. “If I work my hardest, I get a rewarding feeling. It makes it addicting to work 20 hours.”Besides weight-lifting and conditioning, she makes full use of Exeter’s “gun,” which automatically rebounds and passes the ball out again for shooting practice. Heavirland spends hours a week fine-tuning her jump shot, which no doubt helped her to develop the range that led her to shoot nearly 36 percent from beyond the arc last season.Nicole’s skills on the court combined with her academic strength in the classroom garnered interest from schools such as Brown, Yale and Holy Cross, who all have the best chance to view her play with her AAU team, the New England Crusaders. After one AAU tournament in Virginia, West Point contacted her and began to peak her interest. After visiting the school last spring, she knew it was where she wanted to be. “The people really did it for me,” Heavirland said. “They are all leaders and dedicated towards something. I expect to hate it at times, but I know it will be worth the reward at the end.”“I think she is going to be a great player for West Point,” Griffith said. “The coach there is super excited about her because of ‘motor,’ which is a way of saying that she gives all her energy and focus and attention and effort on the court and never stops. He has said to me, ‘We just don't have anybody with motor like that.’ He can't wait to get her there and get her on the court.”While she will certainly be playing basketball, she also hopes to spend as much time as she can with West Point’s rugby team. While the future for her already seems full, Heavirland may also have Olympic potential for upcoming years. Heavirland has already been noticed by the Olympic team’s assistant coach, and her serious work ethic should prove promising for her chances.Before anything else, however, Heavirland still has one more season of high school basketball left to play. Five weeks into that season, the girls’ stand at 8-1, marking the best start for the team in recent history. And the girls have no reason to believe they can’t continue the run.“It’s been a turnaround since my first year here,” Henrich said. “If we keep working as a team and keep pushing each other, we can be a great team. Right now we’re a good team, but if we can work and keep our ego inside, we can be very successful in the long run.”The last question I asked Nicole, as I generally do, was, “how do you see the season shaping up?” She gave me a full-on grin and responded plainly. Looking back on my adjective collection, I did leave out one mentioned word that undoubtedly belongs in the group: confident.“I see us winning the whole thing.”