Superintendent’s Spotlight: Kiera Larney
WVHS senior Kiera Larney has been a standout in the classroom and the lacrosse field from a young age. Recently, her stellar academics and athletics led to her acceptance for fall 2023 by the University of Vermont (Burlington, VT), where she will major in Business and play collegiate lacrosse.
“I did youth soccer, youth basketball, and my parents wanted me to do another youth sport in the spring to kind of keep me away from them,” said Kiera with a laugh. “So I started lacrosse in youth leagues up until fifth grade. That’s when I joined the Metro Magic Blue [travel] team, and I’ve played there ever since.”
Kiera started playing junior varsity lacrosse in grades seven and eight, and was pulled up to varsity during her eighth grade year. She has played on the varsity squad ever since, and served as team captain for the past two seasons. Next year, she will play midfield for the Catamounts, in the NCAA Division I, America East Conference.
“My dad has always been my biggest inspiration. He’s always been in the leader role for me, so I kind of follow what he does,” said Kiera about her role as a team leader and mentor to younger players. “I try to connect with the girls so they know they can talk to you, and on the field, giving constructive criticism always helps.”
One lesson she learned early on, and which she has always applied to her academics, is to stay calm and focused in the face of errors.
“I’d always get flustered when I made a mistake, and my coaches and my dad always said, ‘you have to move on from what happened and continue playing,’” said Kiera. “You make mistakes, it happens. You move on to the next play, the next test, and do better than you did before. I’ve always carried that forward.”
Kiera, who also plays basketball and soccer for the Wildcats, said that even though sports have always been a passion, she’s been careful to make sure academics come first. Does she have any words of wisdom for younger athletes about how she’s managed to strike such a great balance between athletics and academics?
“Making sure academics stays that huge main focus, it’s hard. You have to learn time management,” Kiera said. “Sometimes that means doing homework on the bus or in the car, or even after our game while watching another team.”
Even after having received early acceptance to college, and with the end of her senior year in sight, Kiera continues to push herself. She is taking college algebra and college trig, and wrapping up a three year biomedical course that she’s been in since sophomore year. She is a National Honor Society member and a New York State Public High School Athletics Association (NYSPHAA) Scholar-Athlete. She received the NYSPHAA recognition in both lacrosse and basketball for maintaining her outstanding cumulative GPA throughout both varsity seasons. 95.4%, in case you’re keeping score.
It was Kiera’s impressive record of academic and athletic successes that made her such an attractive and widely-scouted college recruit. Last season, Kiera scored a school record 77 goals. When she signed her National Letter of Intent to play for the Catamounts back in November, her career total goals had reached 106.
“I’m past that now. 120, almost 130ish,” she said. “And I just hit the 200 overall point marker, which is a combination of goals and assists.”
Kiera is proud to be a two-time Section IX Champion. She played on both the Wildcats lacrosse and basketball championship teams last year, and was named a first team All-Section player for lacrosse, and was the Times Herald-Record’s Player of the Year for 2022. It’s been more the same awesomeness this year, with two more marking periods of Magna Cum Laude honor roll status already in the books, and a third shaping up nicely. And, the Wildcats are having another fantastic season.
“We’ve been dominating Section 9 so far,” said Kiera. “It’s looking good and I’m excited.”
She’s also looking forward to savoring the last couple months of her senior year.
“Definitely prom coming up, I’m excited for that, and then graduation. All the big major milestones you look forward to as a senior,” she said with a smile, adding one more thing she hopes she has passed on to younger players about working hard. “You also just want to make sure you take it all in.”
