Gwendolyn Walker completes two-sport career at NFA

By Mike Zummo
Posted 6/10/20

 

When Gwendolyn Walker began playing tennis and golf at Newburgh Free Academy, she didn’t know much about either.

Now, as she graduates from high school, she has experience and …

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Gwendolyn Walker completes two-sport career at NFA

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When Gwendolyn Walker began playing tennis and golf at Newburgh Free Academy, she didn’t know much about either.

Now, as she graduates from high school, she has experience and ability to play two sports for life. She has also excelled in the classroom and was named the Newburgh Free Academy’s valedictorian for the class of 2020.

“It was really crazy; I was surprised (when I found out I was valedictorian),” Walker said. “I didn’t really know how other people or how I was doing in comparison.”

Her accomplishment, being top in her class during a school year that was ending early due to the COVID-19 pandemic, showed the hard work over four years paid off.

Striking a balance between academics, her chosen sports and various extracurricular activities wasn’t always easy, was most difficult during her junior year.

Tennis, which she joined in ninth grade, was the hardest to balance. Golf was only about three days a week.
“I got outlines that would take hours to do,” Walker said. “Sometimes if you had an away match or a home match that ran really long, I sometimes didn’t get home until 8 p.m. Sometimes I was up since 5:30 a.m. I don’t even know how I did it, sometimes. It was really hard.”

John Clark, who coached Walker when she was on the school’s JV tennis team said she was one of the few players doing her work on the bus.

“No one really did that,” he said. “She worked really hard and got what she deserved.”

As the JV coach, one of Clark’s largest concerns was varsity coach Gina Imperiale snatching her up to varsity. Walker eventually moved up during her junior year.

“Gwen came extremely close during her sophomore year to being pulled up,” Imperiale said. “There are a lot of factors at looking at who should be pulled up. If she started playing sooner and been on varsity at a younger age, she might have been.”

There was more to Walker than just two sports and high grades. She also was a member of the Key Club, National Honor Society, Science Honor Society and Spanish Honor Society.

“Even though it was difficult to balance all of them, it did help,” Walker said. “If I did bad on a test and then did well in a tennis match, it gave me multiple things I felt good about and do well in.”

Next, Walker plans to move on to SUNY New Paltz, where she will study visual arts.

“I’m not sure if that’s what I want to do or what I want to major in, but that’s where my interest is now,” she said.

She is not going to play any collegiate sports, but what separates tennis, and even, golf is that there are many opportunities to play it with a small group of others.

“That was one of the things my mom said,” Walker said. “They say tennis is something you can play for your entire life. I hope I can play it my whole life.”

She got all four of her tennis seasons in, but her senior year on the girls’ golf team was canceled due to the pandemic. At first, school was closed indefinitely in the latter half of March, but there was still hope that school would resume, and they could possibly get on the course.

“It didn’t settle in at first,” Walker said. “I don’t think I really understood the situation and at first thought we were going to be back after a week.”

However, it became clear they wouldn’t return to school as Gov. Andrew Cuomo closed the state’s schools on May 1.

“It was really sad,” she said. “I know I’m still 18 and I haven’t experienced much, but nothing like this has ever really happened before.”
Her coaches point to Walker’s humility as a key characteristic.

“You would never even know that Gwen was the top of her class,” Imperiale said. “She underplays herself and there isn’t a more deserving kid.”