NEWTON, NC – It is in our nature to compete. To compete for the best grades, the best job, etc.
People find outlets to get the most out of competing everyday, but sports tend to be the best way an individual can get his or her competitive juices flowing.
This is true for Fred T. Foard High School junior Alexis Wolgemuth. It was in her nature to compete from a very young age, and she has done so with fierceness and determination.
Wolgemuth has possessed the drive right out of the gate during her time with Foard in every sport she has competed in which includes tennis, soccer and basketball.
“I’ve been involved in sports for as long as I can remember,” she said. “Apparently, my first word was, ‘ball.’ I played on my first soccer team at three-and-a-half; since I had so much energy, my parents had to get me out of the house.
“At five, I started taking tennis lessons and played on my first recreational basketball team..No matter what sports I play, my parents have always been very supportive. If I had decided that sports were not for me, my parents would have supported that decision….I will say though that I probably started playing sports as early as I did because of how important sports are in my family. We have a basketball goal in our driveway, and I would shoot on it from a very early age.”
She began making an impact as a freshman on the girls tennis team during the 2018-19 season (33-3 overall, 16-1 doubles) as she and former teammate Emily Campbell defeated Lake Norman Charter’s Zoe Panizza and Annie Thomas in straight sets – 6-2, 6-4 – to become North Carolina High School Athletic Association 2A doubles champions.
Wolgemuth only continued her success in tennis as she dominated during her sophomore season, as well, going 29-0 overall (16-0 singles and 13-0 doubles) en route to her second consecutive doubles state title victory – this time with ex-teammate Hannah Cummings. The duo defeated Hendersonville’s Olivia Pursley and Anna Trace in consecutive sets – 6-0, 6-3.
Also in tennis, she was selected as the 2019 Northwestern Foothills 2A Conference Player of the Year. Additionally, she was an All-Northwestern Foothills 2A Conference selection as a freshman in soccer, playing the positions of goalkeeper and forward.
Furthermore, Wolgemuth has also been a perennial All-Conference basketball guard, having just recently been awarded this honor for the third-straight time. She has averaged 25.2 points, 5.9 rebounds, 2.8 assists and 4.7 steals per game in 30 games played over the last two years (according to MaxPreps.com). During her sophomore campaign in 2019, she amassed over 1,000 career-points with the Lady Tigers.
These last couple of years on the basketball team, she has also had the opportunity to have her mom, Jennifer Howard Wolgemuth, on the sidelines as the assistant coach.
(Howard) Wolgemuth is a local Foard basketball legend (1989-1993) who led her team to a 29-1 record and a 3A State Championship her junior season.
She had her number retired at Foard and scored 2,054 career points. She went on to become a two-time second-team All-ACC player at N.C. State under legendary head coach Kay Yow, while also setting and holding the conference record for best career 3-point percentage (44 percent). In 1997, she was awarded the Frances Naismith Award for a player 5’6” or smaller and was enshrined into the National Basketball Hall of Fame as a recipient of this honor.
“I’ve liked having her as the assistant coach,” said Alexis Wolgemuth. “It’s great that I can talk to her about what’s going on, maybe with a certain play or team and get her opinion, not just as my mother but as a coach.
“At Foard, we have a small team so my mom usually gets to participate in practices so we can go five versus five. We usually don’t guard each other, though. We’re so competitive and take everything seriously that it usually doesn’t end well…I’m a naturally competitive person, so I do compare my skills and accomplishments to my mom’s when possible.”
She said that the two are different in a lot of ways, though, and that it is really hard to compare.
“Soccer is my main sport, but my mom never had an opportunity to play as Foard didn’t have a soccer team back in the day,” she said. “My mom ran track/cross country, but I’ve never competed on the high school level. My mom started playing tennis her freshman year of high school to stay in shape while I’ve had experience in the past playing USTA [United States Tennis Association] tournaments, or basically ‘travel tennis.’ Although we both play basketball, that was really my mom’s only ‘main’ sport while it’s kind of taken a backseat for me in the past year or so as I’ve focused more on soccer.
“So, guess all that to say that we’re different enough that I don’t necessarily feel all the pressure to be just like her. That doesn’t mean I haven’t heard of all about her every time I talk to someone who watched her play. Since she changed her last name when she married my dad [Wade], many people don’t connect the dots immediately with a last name like ‘Wolgemuth.’ But, the second someone finds out that I’m Jennifer Howard’s daughter, they usually follow by saying something like, ‘She was the best little ball player I ever did see here at Foard.’”
She said that her mom has passed on a lot of what she learned from her dad – Wolgemuth’s grandfather – who helped mold her into the basketball player she became. She said that her mom and grandfather emphasized working hard, never giving up and staying humble.
“My mom’s experience with sports, especially at the collegiate level, has been very beneficial to me of late as I’ve looked at playing at the next level. I just finished the recruiting process last November when I committed to Marshall [University] for soccer, and I definitely relied on her advice through the process,” she said. “Knowing that she had gone through it before and was able to land at a program like NC State was really helpful. I can also ask her a lot of questions about being a D1 athlete and sort of know what to expect for my own upcoming experience.”
Now, Wolgemuth is embarking on another chapter of her sports career by competing on the varsity football team as its kicker.
She competed in her first-ever game on Feb. 25, 2021, in front of her home fans in a win over Patton, 28-6. In this contest, Wolgemuth connected on three point-after attempts (PATs) and had five kick-offs. In her second career game on March 5 against Bunker Hill, she had two kick-offs and converted on her only PAT of the night.
She is only the second female kicker with the Tigers to score a point. Wolgemuth said that her teammates have been great so far. She said she got a lot of high-fives and congratulations after her first-ever kicks, and she thought that was pretty neat.
She said that her main emotion after her first game was excitement. She also said that without her team scoring, she would have had nothing to do and gives all the credit to her teammates.
She said that she was happy to execute all of her extra points and compares them to free-throws in basketball. She described them as not too hard, but that everything must be done perfectly to get them to go.
Wolgemuth has always envisioned playing football in some capacity:
“Well, growing up in a sports family, we watched practically every sport imaginable, including football,” she said. “My father grew up in the Philadelphia area before moving to North Carolina for college, so I’ve grown up an Eagles’ fan. I’ve always enjoyed watching football and ‘playing’ when I was younger. I remember running around with Nerf footballs in my yard. I also played some in elementary school at recess. Two-hand touch football was a popular game, and I always enjoyed that.
“I always wanted to play in some sort of football game, and I saw powderpuff as an opportunity to do just that. I knew that I would probably take it more seriously than anyone else, but I still wanted to have fun with it…but, my mom was very adamant that I did not play.”
Wolgemuth said that her grandparents did not allow her mom to play when she was in high school due to the injury risk, and that she was going to do the same thing to her.
“I’ll be honest, we argued about it a lot, and I specifically recall during one argument that she said she would rather have me kick for the football team than play powderpuff,” she said. “That was sort of like a dream come true for me, as I’ve always thought it would be cool to kick and knew I was probably capable with my soccer background. I’ve never really pursued it in the past since football has always been during my tennis season, and I’ve always had so much other stuff going on. So, when I saw Coach [Ryan] Gettys a few weeks later, I sort of mentioned it half-seriously like, ‘Guess what my mom said?’
“He thought it was a good idea and saw no harm in me just coming out one day to kick a few. It was kind of funny because I then told my mom and she denied ever saying anything about allowing me to kick for the football team and was pretty uncertain.”
Wolgemuth said that before kicking for the Tigers varsity football team, she had to get approval from her soon-to-be head soccer coach at Marshall – Michael Swan – to make sure he was okay with her joining the team. She said that he was actually pretty excited about the idea and that since her parents trusted Coach Gettys to keep her safe from injury, she was allowed to try out.
“I would say that the only doubt I had was making sure I was actually going to contribute before agreeing to play,” she said. “As someone who is used to contributing in my other sports, I was not going to take up a new sport if I was never going to play. That was kind of a big deal to me.
“I didn’t want to be on the football team just to be on the football team. If I was not good enough to play, I would accept that and just focus on my main sports. But, if Coach Gettys thought I could contribute, I would play.”
The rest is now history. As far as her personal goals going forward in her sports of choice, Wolgemuth said that she would love to win another state tennis championship or two to close that chapter out. She also said that before the revised basketball schedule during the 2020-21 season, she was hoping to get her 2,000th career-point by the finale of her senior year, but she’s afraid that won’t be possible now.
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