Mourning Those Who Contributed Much

Keyton Wheelock has experienced soccer in several states since she earned her way into the MHSAA record books playing goalie for Traverse City West.

Wheelock, who once owned the career and single season shutout records in Michigan, has traveled extensively to play and coach.

But today’s she’s all but home and still coaching women’s college soccer.

“Hometown roots, hometown kid — that would be my thing,” Wheelock said this summer while sitting on a bench memorializing her grandparents in a park near where she grew up. “It’s lights out coming back here. This will always be home.”

Wheelock, now coaching at Central Michigan University, conducted her youth soccer camp this summer at Long Lake Township Park, the home of some of her favorite childhood memories. The area is also still home to most of her family.

“This area means so much to me, and I want to keep coming back and giving a little bit of soccer back,” Wheelock said, noting drives home of 16 hours from South Dakota and Alabama and 12 from Tennessee and Minnesota. “This is home to me, no matter where I've been, and now I'm only two and a half hours away. This has always been home. These people always have my back. My grandparents lived here. My parents lived here and still live here, and they will live here the rest of their lives in this area.”

Wheelock, a 2004 TC West grad, set the career shoutout mark at 61 with a win at Cheboygan in May of her senior spring.  She also had the most shutouts recorded in a single season, 18, during her junior year. Both marks have since been surpassed. Her career shutout mark remains No. 4 all-time, however. The single season mark is tied for sixth on the all-time list.

Both still stand as records at West, where Wheelock was coached by Jason Carmien, now the school’s athletic director. Carmien found it hard to believe Wheelock graduated 20 years ago as he reflected on her passion for the sport.

“Keyton’s family was unbelievably supportive, and that determination to follow her soccer path still exists today,” Carmien pointed out. “She was an outstanding goalkeeper at West and has had an impressive coaching career. I was glad to see her land at CMU — she has certainly thrived there with the Chips.” 

Wheelock played high school soccer during the earliest days of social media, so the postings that would follow her accomplishments if they occurred now didn’t really exist. But she vividly recalls the pressure her local newspaper and television stations inadvertently applied as she got closer to the career mark.

“The record for career shutouts in high school was something that I chased all the way through my senior year, and it was one of those things we knew it was going to come,” she said. “It felt so stressful at the time in high school. … Everybody kept asking, ‘When are you going to break it?’ It was just was a matter of time.”

It was far from easy, but she did it with the help of a strong defense.

“I had a great defensive line in front of me doing their job to cut my angles and make my job easy,” Wheelock said. “We had some rough games that we should have won — either we gave up a PK in it and I couldn't save the PK or, you know, I made some mistakes and didn't hold the clean sheet.”

After leaving West, Wheelock played in two seasons at South Dakota University. She played out the remainder of her eligibility for Concordia in St. Paul, Minn, before getting into coaching. 

Her college playing days were injury-marred, and her playing career ended with an injury suffered at the Home Depot Center in Carson, Calif.

“It was kind of like a tryout-type thing with the U.S. system out there,” Wheelock recalled. “I came back, finished out my degree and started coaching because I knew at that point I wasn't going to be able to play anymore.”

Her first college coaching job was a five-year stint as assistant coach for Tusculum College in Tennessee. She then was an assistant at South Alabama for three seasons. 

Before her 30th birthday, Wheelock got the opportunity to become a head coach at a Division I school, Louisiana Monroe. She was named Sun Belt Conference Coach of the Year in 2016 after leading her team to its first conference tournament appearance.

“You know, when you're not 30 and you get an opportunity to be a DI coach, you kind of take it,” Wheelock said. “And I jumped on it.”

Wheelock spent four years at Louisiana Monroe before the pandemic resulted in her returning to Michigan and finding the vacancy at CMU.

She is thrilled to see how the landscape in women’s athletics has changed for the better, with growth in numbers, skills and support for high school and college programs.

“Women's sports have taken off — there's so many opportunities out there for women now,” Wheelock excitedly said. “At the end of the day, women's sports matter, and there's enough people out there now pushing that forward.”

The record-setting keeper credits the U.S. women’s national team’s performance during the 1999 World Cup for putting women's soccer on the map. 

Wheelock attended one of the U.S. team’s games – a 7-1 victory over Nigeria in Chicago. With a few members of her family as well as teammates Jackie Keller and Bree Hall, Wheelock saw U.S. goalie Briana Scurry make one of her 137 international appearances – this one taking place just a few matches before Scurry’s memorable world championship penalty kick performance. Nigeria did get one past Scurry for the game’s first goal, Wheelock recalled.

“My uncle was able to get us tickets, and we actually had front row seats to that game at Soldier Field — and it was a phenomenal atmosphere,” Wheelock said of the event drawing more than 65,000 fans. “It was unbelievable to all of a sudden see it at a women’s sporting event.”

Wheelock had some hopes of playing for the national team and professional soccer right up to her career-ending injury. She admitted she would have loved to continue to play, but notes she’s found a home in coaching.

“I'm living my dreams,” she said. “Obviously I would have loved to play professional, but injuries happen. And, I was never the tallest goalkeeper out there. Lots of people said I wasn't going to be able to do what I did, because I was pretty short.” 

Relationships with past coaches and past and current players have brought her just as much satisfaction as playing. And she’s happy to give back to the game.

“This game has given so much to me,” she said. “And for me to give a little bit back to it is what I want. I can't imagine doing anything else.”

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PHOTOS (Top) At left, Keyton Wheelock makes a save for Traverse City West; at right, Wheelock plays keeper during her youth camp this summer. (Middle) Wheelock, now an assistant at Central Michigan. (Below) Wheelock, far right, cheers on the U.S. national team in Chicago in 1999. (Youth camp photo by Tom Spencer, CMU photo courtesy of CMU; all other photos courtesy of Keyton Wheelock.)