E.O. Smith Record-Breaker Named Female Athlete of the Year by CSWA

STORRS, CT — Many high school athletes excel in more than one sport, but very few, if any, can match the 2016 accomplishments of McKenna Dale in the unusual pairing of swimming and basketball.

The E.O. Smith High School senior led the Panthers to the Class LL basketball semifinals in March, then broke two state swimming records in a four day span in November. Her amazing feats during the calendar year have earned Dale the Hal Levy Female Athlete of the Year Award from the Connecticut Sports Writers’ Alliance.

She and Newtown High School wrestler Anthony Falbo will be honored at the 76th Gold Key Dinner April 30 at the Aqua Turf Club in Southington.

“I am definitely surprised; I had no idea I would stand out that much with all the talented athletes in Connecticut,” Dale said in a recent interview with Patch.

The lanky 6-footer, who didn’t start playing basketball until fifth grade, began the year by leading E.O. Smith to its first Central Connecticut Conference girls basketball tournament title, averaging 24.3 points per game, including 30 in an 81-68 win over South Windsor in the championship game. She then averaged 21.3 points per game in the Class LL state tournament, which saw the Panthers fall 69-60 to Greenwich in the semifinals despite her 26-point effort.

E.O. Smith wound up the 2015-16 season with a 25-3 record, with Dale averaging 20 points and nine rebounds per contest.

“It’s always been our team goal to make it to the state finals at Mohegan Sun, and last year we had an extremely strong team that worked well together,” she said. “It was really exciting to get to the semis; we were really confident and playing well, so to lose was really devastating. It really gave us motivation for this year.”

Panther coach Mary Roickle said she recognized Dale’s talent during her first season, when Dale was the only freshman to make the varsity squad.

“We knew we had a very gifted basketball player, who at that time was probably the best shooter on the team as a freshman,” Roickle said. “She has evolved so much from that to her senior year. It’s one thing to be a shooter; it’s another thing to be a complete basketball player.”

Come September, it was into the pool for Dale, who had won the 2015 Class L championships as a junior in the 50 freestyle and 100 freestyle. Her 50 freestyle time of 23.44 had broken the former class record of 23.51, set four years earlier by Elizabeth McDonald of Pomperaug.

On Nov. 15 at Southern Connecticut State University, Dale successfully defended both titles at the Class L meet, posting a 23.17 time in the 50 freestyle that eclipsed not only her own class record, but also the state mark of 23.20, held since 1997 by Lauren Moore of Wilton.

Four days later at Yale University, Dale topped herself, shattering her own state record in the 50 freestyle (23.03) and adding the 100 freestyle crown with a personal best 50.96.

“My goal was to win the Open, not necessarily to set a record,” she said. “When I set the record at states, it was really surprising and exciting, then to break it again at the Open was incredible. It’s really hard to improve from meet to meet.”

Rather than rest, the dual citizen of New Zealand and the United States immediately got into international basketball mode, traveling to Fiji to play for the New Zealand team at the FIBA Oceania U-18 Championships. She averaged 10.4 points per contest in five tournament games, which saw her team place second to Australia.

Upon returning to the E.O. Smith campus, Dale picked up right where she left off the previous winter.

This season, she is averaging 23.3 points in her first 17 games, including a season-high 39 points against Manchester on Jan. 13.

After early-season struggles with injuries, the Panthers have turned things around since flipping the calendar to 2017. The team is 11-2 since the beginning of January, boosting its overall mark to 13-5 with two regular season games to play, and has won six straight contests, including a 67-62 victory over then-No. 2 Enfield on Jan. 27.

She is a three-time All-CCC basketball selection and was a first-team All-State player in 2016.

Despite her individual achievements, Dale said without hesitation the top highlight of her career was the team’s CCC tournament championship in 2016.

“No E.O. Smith girls team had ever done that,” she said. “We had worked so hard for it all season, and it was such a rewarding experience.”

A true scholar-athlete, Dale is a high honors student who has committed to play Division I basketball at Brown University of the prestigious Ivy League.

“Sometimes it’s hard to keep a good balance between athletics and academics, but academics has always been a high priority and will continue to be, going to an Ivy League school,” she said.

Gold Keys will be presented to NFC champion and past Super Bowl winner Dwight Freeney of the Atlanta Falcons, five-time Olympic archer Butch Johnson, retired Cheshire High School swimming coach Ed Aston and Farmington High School boys soccer coach Steve Waters.

Tickets to the Gold Key Dinner are $75, and can be purchased by contacting dinner chairman Tim Jensen of Patch Media Corp. at tim.jensen@patch.com or 860-394-5091; or CSWA President Matthew Conyers of The Hartford Courant at 860-874-4166, or mconyers@courant.com. Tickets can also be obtained by mailing a check to the Connecticut Sports Writers' Alliance, P.O. Box 70, Unionville, CT 06085.

Proceeds from the event benefit the Alliance's Bohdan Kolinsky Memorial Sports Journalism Scholarship.

Photo courtesy of Darren Dale