Banner Elk, NC--Today we meet up with junior defender Colleen
Paxton as we continue our series of Up Close & Personal
interviews with the Lady Bobcats. Paxton, a communication arts
major, hails from Elgin, SC where she attended River View High
School.
1. What made you decide to come to Lees-McRae?
I noticed the school by a brochure for the wildlife rehab program.
The lacrosse coach contacted me and offered me a scholarship to
play.
2. How long have you been playing lacrosse? I
have been playing lacrosse for four years. I started my senior year
in high school. I played center midfield and won over 90% of the
draws I took. My team went undefeated and won state for the only
time in our high school's history.
3. What are your personal goals for this
season? I want to be THE defender that nobody wants to go
up against. I also want to get faster and work on my endurance. I
want to improve my stick skills, especially changing hands on the
fly.
4. What's your favorite lacrosse memory here at
Lees-McRae so far? When it was pouring down rain at
practice. We did diving shot drills and played around in the mud.
It was a lot of fun.
5. Who has been the most influential person on your
athletic career? I have been. I get pressure from all
angles to do this, do that. In the end I'm the only one who can
make the really important decisions about my athletic career.
6. If you weren't playing lacrosse, what other sport
would you play? Besides the fact that I already play
soccer as well, I would want to go out for the volleyball team. I
played four years of varsity in high school, and it's the one thing
I miss.
7. What is your major and what do you plan to do with
your degree? I'm a communication arts major. I plan to go
into non-profit work, caring for poor, abuse, underprivileged and
orphaned children. Maybe even on the animal side of things as well.
I will use my communications degree to help launch my career as a
novelist and as an freelance photographer/web designer.
8. If you could travel back in time to any point in
history, where would you go? When the earth was still one
big continent, and everything was how it started. Ancient Greece
during the old school Olympics would be sweet too.
9. What is your favorite book? I just love
reading anything fiction.
10. What is your favorite food? I love really
good, fresh bread with something to dip it in.
11. If you could visit anywhere in the world, where
would it be? I would travel to Greece because it would be
beautiful and has such a rich history.
12. What is one word that describes you and
why? Complex...there is no way I'm going to be able to sum
myself up in one word.
Colleen's Story … I've always been the
off-the-wall girl I am now. Playing sports was a great way for my
family to make sure I didn't get into too much trouble because of
free time. Coming from stuffy, humid SC has really made me
appreciate the beautiful, rural mountains. I looked for colleges
mainly in South Carolina because I had been to either a soccer,
volleyball, or lacrosse camp at most of them. Sports always held a
big sway over the schools I was looking into. I think I knew deep
down that I could change my mind about a major but if I had nothing
to occupy my time, I'd go nuts. Lees-McRae was a last minute, spur
of the moment choice. I had never even seen LMC until I moved in
during orientation. But here I am, and in a total of only 3 1/2
years I'll be an alumnus. I don't know if it could have happened
anywhere else.
