Penn-Trafford grad Mackenzie Powell makes impact in 2 sports at Westminster

Penn-Trafford graduate Mackenzie Powell didn’t want to choose between basketball and soccer when she was looking at colleges.

So she found a school where she could play both, and Powell is making an impact as a two-sport athlete during her freshman year at Division III Westminster.

“I love it,” she said. “I just couldn’t give up either sport. I love both of them. I knew it was going to be a challenge, but I absolutely love the coaches. It felt like the perfect fit. It’s been awesome. I am a busy body, and I need to constantly be doing things, so it’s been good for me.”

Powell played midfield for the soccer team and started 18 of 20 games, finishing with two goals and an assist as the Titans went 16-3-1. Westminster was upset by Chatham, 4-3, in double overtime in the Presidents’ Athletic Conference championship game. Soccer season didn’t end until Nov. 13, and by then, the basketball team had been working out for several weeks.

“I think basketball shape and fitness is different than soccer,” said Powell, a 5-foot-8 forward in basketball. “I did have to get back into that shape because it’s sprint, sprint, sprint in basketball, whereas soccer is more sprint, jog. It’s always been a transition for me.”

Titans basketball coach Rosanne Scott said she was wowed with how quickly Powell assimilated into the team.

“I knew the skill set she had,” Scott said. “She’s an athlete. The only thing with her was remembering how to use the ball with her hands instead of her feet.”

Powell missed the basketball team’s opener Nov. 16, played sparingly in the Wooster tip-off tournament Nov. 20-21 and sat out the team’s first PAC games Dec. 1 and 4. But she flashed her potential Dec. 15 against Geneva, when she totaled 15 points, eight assists and seven rebounds in a 102-80 victory. The performance earned her PAC Rookie of the Week, an honor she also received during soccer season.

“She sees the floor really well,” Scott said. “You would look at her and think she’s a 3 or 4 position wise, but she sees the floor like a point guard. Some of the passes she makes, I’m like, ‘Whoa.’

“She attacks the basket really well. She’s really physical on the defensive end. She boxes out really well. And she’s a great teammate on top of that.”

Powell, who is averaging 4.2 points and 2.8 rebounds in 19.0 minutes, said her biggest improvements have come on defense.

“As a kid, it was all about offense for me,” she said. “I wasn’t great defensively. I’ve really learned the importance of the defensive side of the floor as I’ve gotten older. It wins you games.”

Powell earned all-section honors in soccer and basketball at P-T and had numerous suitors for each sport. She said D-I Robert Morris and several D-II schools expressed interest for soccer. In basketball, it was mostly D-III programs, and that’s where Westminster entered the picture. Scott saw Powell play and said she fit Westminster’s system perfectly because of her ability to play “positionless” basketball.

Scott then told Titans soccer coach Girish Thakar about Powell, and he did his research before the coaches agreed Powell was the rare recruit who could excel for both programs. It’s unusual but not unprecedented for Westminster, as Freedom graduate Jen Cantalla started at goalie for the soccer team and at guard for the basketball squad in the early 2010s.

“It was always soccer growing up. That was my No. 1 sport,” Powell said. “I always had dreams of playing D-I soccer. In high school, it kind of flipped where I fell in love with basketball.

“I think soccer is more of a fight that I didn’t want to give up, the competitiveness, the physicality of the game. And then basketball, I just thought it was a fun game. I like the balance. I love them both.”