Wolverine unites us all

Amanda Watson was one of the most competitive students at Wakefield High during her high school years, although she didn't earn a varsity letter.

She had been a softball player and cheerleader at North Raleigh Christian in middle school, but after she swam one year at Wakefield she thought her athletic days were over.

She graduated in 2005 and never was a member of any of the Wolverines' sports teams.

She was never in the homecoming court or any of that stuff.

Like a majority of high school students, her memories of high school athletics come from watching from the bleachers.

"I loved going to the football games and especially the basketball games," Watson said. "They were events that you planned other things around."

The great thing about the games, she said, was how they unified the students.

She had friends in the chorus. She played the lead role of Nancy in "Oliver," so she knew the drama people. She was in several academic honor societies.

But on game nights, she was simply a Wolverine, one of the mass of students huddled in heavy coats during football games or standing much of the time during basketball games.

She remembers the excitement of the games but few details.

"Honestly, what I remember most about the games was being able to go to a social gathering with all of my friends," she said. "We came together, and we pulled for our team. It was great."

Her experience is similar to that of most high school students who will attend football playoff games on Friday night.

Athletics bring people together -- to play, to watch, to cheer, to dream and to hope.

High school athletics teach lifelong lessons. Perseverance, sacrifice, dedication and loyalty are among the traits that coaches are supposed to convey.

But Watson learned those same lessons in the arts and channeled her competitiveness in other ways. She pursued a high academic class ranking and got it.

She focused even more on her academics after she decided she wanted to study nursing at the University of North Carolina.

"I just learned to set a goal and chase the dream," she said.

Watson entered her first pageant because she could sing and the pageant offered scholarship money. She capped her first year by winning the Miss National Sweetheart in 2006.

She combined two of the most important things in her life in the pageants -- music and raising money for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

ALS is better known as Lou Gehrig's disease. She lost her grandfather to the disease and Watson has raised tens of thousands of dollars for research. She has been the ALS national spokeswoman.

She has been refined by fire. About a year ago, she was first runner-up in four consecutive preliminary pageants -- two girls on stage, each dying on the inside and smiling on the outside. And each time, the other girl was picked.

So she worked harder.

The girl who nobody at Wakefield would have thought of as an athlete began to work out two hours every day in the gym.

It worked out well for her.

Watson was crowned as Miss North Carolina in June.

She didn't develop her drive through athletics or learn about dedication there, but athletics did do one big thing for her.

"I had a lot of fun at those games," she said.

We need to never forget that having fun is one of the reasons we have high school athletics.

And you can have fun, even if you don't play.