NCU Magazine: Remembering Amanda

She was excellent.

Amanda Evans will forever be remembered by these words. A freshman at North Central, Amanda died unexpectedly on Thanksgiving Day. A member of the 2007 NCCAA National Championship Cross Country team, she was the Women’s fifth runner that day - the last runner whose score counted toward the women’s first place finish. Coach Trey Meadows met Amanda last April at College Days. "Right away she was a very engaging, sweet-hearted person," he said. In August, Amanda arrived from her home state of Washington a week before most of the freshman class. As fellow freshman girls trickled in, she showed them around campus and the city. Says Meadows, “She was just that kind of person.” Amanda’s engaging personality made her likeable to everyone who knew her, "where you walk away different, and in a very simple sense, aware of the goodness in somebody’s heart,” said Meadows. This made the Friday morning after Thanksgiving Day all the more painful for him to notify the rest of the track & field family. “As you would expect, there’s nothing to say; you’re just crushed. Especially for somebody like her, it just doesn’t make any sense.” A photo of Amanda mid-stride during the National Championship meet is now the screen saver on Coach Meadows’ computer. Many in the NCU Community also use this picture on their Facebook web site profiles with the caption, ‘She Was Excellent.’

We’re Going Through this Together

Meadows let his team know that, “it’s ok to be crushed by it, and to respond whatever way your initial response is. And I want to give you that opportunity to [feel] that emotion that you are [feeling], because it’s only going to cause you more problems than if you try and compact your emotions.” Mostly, Meadows tried to communicate to his team that they were going to get through this together. The Lord is faithful, but sometimes you’ve got to find out how faithful you are in those situations…especially when you feel the sense of youth that’s there on a team of nine girls, six of them first-year freshmen. So there’s that sense of, we’ve got so much ahead of us, and that thought process is totally altered right away.”

Stepping Up

In the midst of grief, Meadows saw the men’s team, in whom he’d consistently instilled the message of manhood and being there for others, step up; those stronger, lending their shoulders to students more deeply affected. Even in tragedy, perhaps especially in tragedy, Rams athletics is a family, and they continue to get through this together.

It All Comes Together

Less than a week later, before the first home basketball game after Amanda’s death, the team captains approached Men’s Basketball coach Trent Emenecker to ask if the team could honor Amanda in some way. “One thing about this campus, the kids are much closer than when I went to college,” Emenecker said. As they stepped onto the court, each player’s wrist was taped with “No. 5” . Emenecker recalls the pre-game prayer: “Lord, we’re always doing it for You, but tonight, we’re doing it for Amanda as well.”