Only Canadian to win the NCAA Woman of the Year Award off to medical school
April 21, 2020
Countless Canadian female student-athletes have attended American universities in the last three decades.
Angela Mercurio, however, stands alone as the first to win the notable National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Woman of the Year Award.
It was established in 1991 to recognize graduating female student-athletes who excel in academics, athletics, service and leadership.
The Kitchener native was a three-time Nebraska track & field All-American and four-year letter winner.
Mercurio admitted she was stunned when the winner was announced last October at a banquet in Indianapolis celebrating the Top 30 honourees.
Angela Mercurio is the first Canadian to win the NCAA Woman of the Year Award (Photo contributed)
“I didn’t think I would win it because I didn’t do as well athletically as I thought I should,” the triple and long jumper said. “I missed some of my goals there and I just didn’t think I reached the threshold where I could come out on top.”
Mercurio was wrong.
While injuries hampered the 2018 Nebraska Outstanding Scholar Award winner performance on the field, her academic accomplishments, leadership and community engagement were off the charts.
Graduating with a 3.98 cumulative GPA (grade point average) as a double major in Biochemistry and Women & Gender Studies, she earned two second-team Google Cloud Academic Awards, three Arthur Ashe Jr. Sports Scholar Awards and five United States Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association All-Academic Honours.
Mercurio used her spare time to good effect, serving as a teaching assistant in three classes at her university, interning at the local YWCA where she helped plan a STEM-focussed curriculum and facilitated a STEM club for girls that met weekly and performing as a peer mentor in a campus Athlete2Athlete program. She also started a Black female student-athlete group at Nebraska to create a community of acceptance and empowerment and volunteered at the People’s City Mission shelter and on a medical mission to India in 2017.
She is the first Big Ten athlete and second Cornhusker after volleyball player Billie Winsett-Fletcher in 1996 to capture the award since its inception 29 years ago.
“This is the greatest honour to be bestowed on me and it proves that hard work pays off,” said Mercurio who was the inaugural recipient of the $10,000 Rose Bowl Game Keith Jackson Postgraduate scholarship presented last October to a student from the Big Ten and Pac-12 conferences for outstanding achievement in academics and civic service.
Angela Mercurio graduated with honours from the University of Nebraska (Photo contributed)
Accepted by several universities in pursuit of a medical career, Mercurio has narrowed her choices to Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Penn and Washington University in St. Louis.
“I know I will be trained to be an amazing doctor and have access to research opportunities and mentors at these universities, but the determining factor as to where I go will be financial aid because medical schools are very expensive,” she said.
The cost to attend Harvard Medical School in the 2020-21 academic year with living expenses included is US$97,080.
While Canadian students aren’t eligible for federal financial aid, a few American schools offer loans and grants.
Mercurio has until April 30 to make her decision.
In the meantime, she’s working full-time as a Research Assistant at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City that specializes in orthopedic surgery and rheumatologic conditions treatment.
“I work with female orthopedic surgeons and sports medicine specialists as I have an interest in those fields and in women’s health,” the certified doula pointed out.
Developing a love for reading and learning at an early age, Mercurio played soccer, basketball and volleyball in elementary and high school before settling on track & field.
She was a member of Supreme Athletics which is Waterloo’s top track & field club with Janusz Tomko as head coach.
“Once I got to high school, coach didn’t want us playing more than one sport,” recalled the St. Mary’s High School graduate. “He said, ‘You could be average in a lot of things or you can be the best at one thing’. That was when I chose to focus on the triple jump.”
The hop, skip and jump contest is the most complicated track & field event to master as Mercurio found out.
“I just couldn’t get it until a teacher told me to pretend I am pedalling a bicycle,” she said. “I tried that and it worked.”
Focussed on pursuing her track career and academic studies in the United States, Mercurio committed to an Ivy League school without realizing it didn’t offer athletic scholarships.
“When I found that out, it was late in the recruitment process so I e-mailed letters with my marks and accomplishments to nearly 40 schools,” the 2013 Ontario Federation of School Athletic Associations (OFSAA) triple jump runner-up with a prep best 12.00 metres pointed out. “The coach at Nebraska responded within five minutes of receiving the correspondence saying, ‘I don’t know how we haven’t heard of you, but we want you to come and visit’.”
The longest tenured active coach in Nebraska athletics among Big Ten track and field programs having joined the university four decades ago, Gary Pepin is considered one of the premier jump coaches in the United States.
That factored into Mercurio’s decision to be a Cornhusker.
“They were one of the few schools at the time where the triple jump coach is also the head coach,” she noted. “I knew I wasn’t going to be overlooked. Often, track athletes get most of the attention and are more celebrated. I knew that as a jumper, I would be taken seriously at Nebraska.”
Angela Mercurio in action (Photo contributed)
The transition to university wasn’t smooth for Mercurio who was diagnosed with a rare knee tumor before the start of her freshman season.
“Though benign, I had to undergo surgery and there was always a risk it would return,” the 2015 indoor season redshirt said. “It happened as soon as I got on campus so I missed out on meetings, training and a lot of that early experience.”
Beset with injuries during her collegiate journey, Mercurio decided to hang up the cleats after suffering another serious one in her final university meet.
“Going in, I had a very bad Achilles pain,” she recalled. “With nothing to lose, I competed and suffered a bad calf muscle pull. It took also most seven weeks for me to recover. At the time, I was considering taking the year off to train to make Team Canada again and possibly gain an Olympic spot. The injury changed my trajectory and I decided it was time to focus on my ultimate goal of going to medical school.”
The Canadian junior triple jump champion after her freshman season, Mercurio represented Canada at the 2015 Pan American Junior Athletics championship in Edmonton where she finished seventh with an 11.93-metre jump and the World University Games two years later in Taiwan.
Held in high esteem by her Nebraska teammates and coaches, Pepin said Mercurio is a caring, motivated and disciplined person who shows initiative and common sense, embraces teamwork and is consistent, responsible and a problem solver.
“As a person, Angela would be amongst the very, very elite that I have coached,” he added. “I have had a number of student athletes that have gone on to be medical doctors, lawyers and so on. She has really special qualities and is way more than well-rounded. She’s highly exceptionable.”
Angela Mercurio with proud parents Karen Mercurio & Stanford Warmington (Photo contributed)
Turning 25 on April 7, Mercurio acknowledged her parents – Stanford Warmington is of Jamaican heritage and Karen Mercurio – role in her life.
“My mom is generous, compassionate and selfless,” the 2019 Big Ten Indoor champion said. “She drove me to all my meets and instilled a sense of confidence in me. Dad is very supportive and always has words of wisdom about life and life choices that he willingly shares with me.”
Far too many student athletes view scholarships as a ticket to mainly advance their sports careers even though a select few will compete at the Olympics or professionally.
Mercurio used hers to secure tools to pursue a career where she can make a real difference in people’s lives.
