Avon High School Adds Three New Coaches

From Avon High School Athletic Department

Just two weeks into the new year, Avon Athletic Director Greg Ferry has already added three new coaches to his staff, filling vacancies in softball, girls lacrosse and cheerleading. “I want all of Avon High’s athletes to experience great coaching” he explained “and Megan Godwin, Cat Hanks and Alexis Safo-Agyeman will deliver just that.”

The three women have their work cut out for them. Hanks is taking over a team that lost key players in all areas of play, but is strong in numbers, while Godwin and Safo-Agyeman will be tasked with growing teams whose numbers have dwindled over the years. Ferry is confident his new coaches are up to their challenges.

Meg Godwin will take over for longtime softball coach Jon Snyder, who retired last season. A 2014 Eastern Connecticut State University graduate with a degree in Communications, Meg was recruited by the Warriors to play softball and ended up walking onto the soccer team that fall. She was a four-year varsity starter for both teams – as shortstop & utility player for softball, and center back for soccer.

A Connecticut native, Meg grew up playing softball in the Manchester town league and later at Manchester High School, from which she graduated in 2010. She has two younger brothers, but is undeniably the most serious athlete in the Godwin clan. Immediately after graduation, Meg found work as a Corporate Technical Recruiter - a job she liked but didn’t love. In her spare time, she continued (and continues) to coach the CT Eliminators, a three-season U-14 travel softball team out of Rocky Hill, and play for the club’s U23 and U30 teams. This, she loves. So, when she saw the Avon softball coach posting, she jumped on it – leaving the corporate world at the same time that a paraprofessional job at Avon Middle School opened up. “I knew when I interviewed with Mr. Ferry that coaching wouldn’t work with my current career,” she explains, “so I took a leap of faith and, luckily, it all came together.” Meg was hired as a seventh grade AMS paraprofessional in January.

Meg’s U14 team describes her as a “tough but fun coach”. Her primary focus is the basics: every day, her players need to show that they know and continue to refine the fundamentals of their position(s). And, as a ‘utility player,’ she is skilled and experienced in all of them, so she can assess and teach any of her players. This is her priority for year one as Avon’s new softball coach. “I want to see where my players are now, and help them develop and improve from there. Also, I want to start preparing for the big challenges of the CCC in 2016” she explains, noting that she really looks forward to playing against her alma mater, Manchester, which is a member of that league.

Meg Godwin is confident she can build excitement for the sport she loves in a town where other spring sports dominate. “I know this is a tough assignment,” she confides. “Avon isn’t a big softball town.” Yet.

Unlike Meg Godwin, Catherine ‘Cat’ Hanks has the advantage of coaching a sport that Avon has enthusiastically embraced: girls lacrosse. A 2002 graduate of Somers High School, where she was varsity goalie for the field hockey and lacrosse teams, Cat went on to play at Westfield State University and earned her BA and MA in Elementary Education there in 2006 and 2007. She is a 6th grade teacher at Thompson Brook School, specializing in Reading.

While completing her masters in 2007, Cat accepted a position as WSU’s Assistant Varsity Field Hockey Coach and, that spring, as Assistant Varsity Girls Lacrosse Coach. She coached for the next six years, while teaching at nearby Gateway Regional Elementary School. Eager to return to CT, Cat applied and was hired by the Avon schools in 2014; she was thrilled when she learned of the coaching opportunity months later. “I love teaching, but I really missed coaching,” she explains. Now, this energetic multi-tasker will get to do both again.

A big part of Cat’s ‘task-rich’ life is music. When she and her twin sister were just seven years old, they were bit by the Scottish music bug when their parents to the to a local festival. They spent the next years studying Scottish dance, then bagpipes and, ultimately settled on drums. Since 2004, Cat has played tenor drum in a Scottish bagpipe band that competes internationally. In 2011, her band Oran Mor, placed 12th overall at the world piping championships in Glasgow, Scotland. Presently, she plays in a new band out of Boston, and teaches drumming lessons and seminars throughout the northeast on weekends.

Cat looks forward to bringing the discipline and energy that have helped her succeed as student, athlete and musician, to Avon High School. A true competitor, she likes to win games by getting the basics of skill, work ethic and attitude right. “I have high expectations of my players, but I like to have fun, too” she says. Over the years, Cat has had some great coaching mentors who taught her the value of patience and team cohesion; she works hard to foster both on her teams. Looking ahead to spring, she says: “My mantra is ‘practice like you play’, so I’ll expect the girls to give their all whenever they’re on the field. And,” she adds, “I’m going to do just the same.”

From day one as Avon’s new cheerleading coach, Alexis Safo-Agyeman will be giving her all - and trying to make up for lost time. The squad has been without a coach this season, and their new coach hopes to have them ready and back on the court for the last three home basketball games. A very small squad and a school culture that doesn’t actively support cheering, just add to the challenge. Undaunted, Alexis says: “I’m very excited. I love cheering and I know what good cheering looks like, what it can do for the athletes on the squad, and how it can really boost school spirit.”

She certainly does. A 2004 graduate of Conard High School and its award-winning cheerleading squad, Alexis went on to cheer for Eastern Connecticut State University where she introduced the squad to competitive cheering. (They are now a regular top DIII contender.) She earned dual degrees in Communications and Sociology at ECSU in 2008, and then a Masters Degree in Communications from Bay Path College in 2009. Since graduating, she has worked in Education - six years with the West Hartford Public Schools; presently, as Admissions Counselor at American International College in Springfield, Massachusetts; and through it all, as Assistant Coach of the top-rated Conard High School cheerleading team. “At Conard, and at the collegiate level, cheerleading is a sport. It demands a lot – fitness, flexibility, stamina and coordination,” she explains. “I want to show the Avon squad and their classmates how exciting and athletic cheerleading can be.”

A West Hartford native, Alexis is a first-generation American, part of a blended family of nine children; her parents emigrated here from Ghana. “I learned hard work from my parents. I practice it and I expect it from my team.” Her passion and skill make her an in-demand private coach for high school students preparing for college try-outs, and a favorite youth coach at area clinics and camps. She’ll be starting practice in Avon the first week in February, setting high expectations for the individual girls and the team as a whole. “In the end, I want to build a team of girls that’s confident calling themselves ‘cheerleaders’ and confident representing their school.” Go Alexis!

Other stories on Patch:

• Police: Super Bowl Argument Turns Into Gun Threat, Barricaded Suspect
• Punxsutawney Phil Makes His Groundhog Day Prediction
• Trumbull Woman Rescued During Mount Washington Hike