'She didn't quit:' Madigan Kelly's Lewiston, LC State track legacy

Jun. 12—Lewis-Clark State senior hurdler Madigan Kelly was ready to race.

Then lightning flashed across the sky and the 2026 NAIA Outdoor Track and Field National Championships in Asheville, N.C., were put on hold.

Kelly spent the next two-and-a-half hours piled into a gymnasium with her teammates, coaches and athletes from across the nation.

The disruption could have thrown her off and made that preliminary women’s 100-meter hurdles her final collegiate race.

But it didn’t.

Kelly and her coaches knew a lightning delay was a possibility. They arrived at the track two hours prior to her scheduled race time, warmed up like they usually would and got into the blocks just before her heat was pushed back.

With her headphones on in that crowded gym, Kelly had to come to terms with her situation.

LCSC hurdles coach Kurtis Bonner said that his focus during the delay was on keeping Kelly mentally prepared and physically fueled on that late May day.

“I found an Alani (energy drink) — what she loves for caffeine,” Bonner said. “And that put a big smile on her face, and she’s like, ‘I’m ready to run.'”

When the storm clouds cleared, Kelly burst off the block like she had done countless times before.

She was the first to clear the first hurdle, then the second, then the third — exactly what Bonner told her was the key to advancing.

“And then I’m like, ‘Oh, she’s pulling away, she’s pulling away,'” Bonner said. “She did what she had to do. We’re in the final. She’s an All-American.'”

Kelly not only gave herself one more race with her third NAIA All-American honor — she did it by surpassing her own school record in 13.80 seconds. She placed fourth in the final to polish off a decorated track and field career that began in middle school, blossomed at Lewiston High and soared at Lewis-Clark State.

“She’s a gal that it was pretty evident early on, her commitment, devotion and sometimes obsession with hurdling,” LC State coach Mike Collins said.

A love for the sport

Track was a natural choice for a girl from a family of local athletes, and LC State — where her grandfather, Ron Ellis, played baseball and basketball in the late 1960s and early ’70s — just made sense for her, Kelly said.

It also provided a way for her to spend time with her mother, Carrie Kelly, a childhood survivor of non-Hodgkin lymphoma that cut her high school track tenure short and eliminated her chance at a college career of her own.

“She loved running and that was her passion, like it was mine, and having it cut short to cancer definitely wasn’t what she had in mind,” Madigan Kelly said. “Every conversation we’ve had about track and running, it just kind of furthered it, just deepened my mom and I’s relationship.”

Carrie would accompany Madigan to the Vollmer Bowl in Lewiston and watch her practice individually year-round.

“Fun to go down and spend some one-on-one time with her,” Carrie Kelly said. “I’m not a coach, so it’s not like I was there to give her pointers or anything, just to be supportive.”

Carrie and her husband, Madigan’s father Mike Kelly, only missed one meet during her college career, traveling across the region and country to support her. Carrie’s parents, Ron and Connie Ellis, were frequent LHS and LCSC track supporters as well.

Kelly said she was not a perfect hurdler in middle school and some coaches advised her to find a different event.

She didn’t listen.

“I fell more times than I could count, but each time I got back up and just had this fire of wanting to continue,” Kelly said. “I just was determined to make it work.”

When she got to high school, Kelly began working with then-Lewiston coach Keith Stuffle, who was a hurdler himself first at Orofino High School and then at the University of Arizona and Northern Arizona.

Stuffle said that Kelly was a joy to work with and put in the work to improve throughout her track career, earning state meet berths her junior and senior years.

Not only did she physically evolve, her mentality changed, too.

The morning of her senior state championship meet in 2021, Kelly looked Stuffle in the eye and said she was going to win, Stuffle said.

She fell short of first place that day, but to Stuffle, that was exactly the moment he had been waiting for from her.

“That’s the hard part about getting to that level of belief — you may not do it, and you gotta live with it, and that’s what happened that day,” Stuffle said. “But the good news is, she didn’t quit.”

Bounce back

Tracy Collins, wife of LC State coach Mike Collins and head athletic trainer for the Warriors, wears a lot of hats in Lewiston.

She’s a driver at times, safely transporting athletes to events. She’s a team photographer, standing beyond the finish line to capture the finest frames she can.

And to Kelly and a slew of Warriors, she is a “second mom.”

“She’s just there for everything,” Kelly said of Tracy Collins. “Even if I had a bad day, I could always go to Tracy and just vent it out. She’s very honest. She’ll give you the honest truth, and she’ll help you, support you throughout the way.”

To Tracy Collins, the title of “second mom” is a huge honor and was especially important in guiding Kelly through a chronicle of injuries.

The lower leg and foot issues emerged during her sophomore year of college, Kelly said. She would limit the number of meets and events that she did, but she still managed to rack up the accolades, claiming three individual Cascade Conference championships between her sophomore and junior seasons and becoming an NAIA All-American in the outdoor 100 hurdles in 2024 — her first All-American honor.

For hurdlers, range of motion is everything. They need a baseline speed and the ability to drive their feet off the ground and through the hurdle, while getting their trail leg over as well.

That repetitive and demanding process can naturally lead to injuries and it also requires a particular approach in which Kelly would practice hurdling fundamentals twice a week and running on the remaining days, which allowed her to adjust her stride pattern over the course of her career, Bonner said.

“(Her injuries) gave us a chance to actually become a better hurdler. And then when we got back to being fast, it’s like, ‘Okay, now we’re even better than we were before,'” Bonner said. “It allowed us to just find better versions of herself. I guess it was a blessing in disguise.”

However, her injuries became so severe that she had to redshirt her would-be senior season.

“It was definitely a low point of not being able to compete, and definitely facing the burnout of sport,” Kelly said, “and kind of losing the love for the sport if I’m not able to do what I want to do.”

When Kelly returned to the track, the times that she was used to clocking weren’t there at first. Her support system was.

“Having my teammates, and trainers and coaches being there to support me every step of the way to encourage me to keep going and show me that it’s much more than that, and it’s about the community of the sport and it’s a lot larger than just the times that I’m running (helped),” Kelly said.

However, it didn’t take long for Kelly to regain her times, running an 8.51 in the 60 hurdles at indoor nationals in March.

And when she crossed the finish line, who was there but Tracy Collins, with a big hug.

“You always hope that a student-athlete can return to the level that they were prior,” Tracy Collins said. “That was a pretty special moment, because she could prove it to herself and anybody else that cared to watch that she was back in, if not as good, probably better form.”

Kelly’s legacy

Kelly, Mike Collins said, is the kind of athlete that he can point to as a great example for future Warriors.

“You don’t have to travel halfway across the country to be an All-American,” Collins said, “to compete at a high level and experience some really good things.”

Kelly was a part of a talented crop of local athletes who stuck around to compete at LCSC.

Mike Collins’ daughter, Emily Collins, is a year younger than Kelly. Other former Bengals turned Warriors who ran with Kelly include Jennah Carpenter and Kobe Wessels.

Kelly said that Carpenter and Emily Collins are among her closest friends.

Carpenter, who graduated last year, and Kelly often roomed with one another, Kelly said. The two have known each other since the third grade.

With her final race weeks behind her, Kelly wrapped up her student teaching and will be a third-grade teacher at Webster Elementary.

She will also look to lend her talents as a volunteer coach — an area where she already has some experience helping LHS athletes navigate the mental blocks of competition and sharing her story.

Her grade school kids are aware of her career, and aren’t shy to ask questions, Kelly said.

“‘Ms. Kelly, can we go race at recess?’ and ‘I don’t think you’re really that fast, Ms. Kelly. I definitely could beat you.’ They just cracked me up,” Kelly said. “It’s so fun being able to share my love for the sport with others and help them find their love in whatever sport that they’re looking at.”

In molding young minds, “Ms. Kelly’s” impact on Lewiston has just begun.

Taylor can be reached at 208-848-2260, staylor@lmtribune.com, or on X or Instagram @Sam_C_Taylor.