Meet Staley’s Hayden Gregg, The Star’s Male Scholar-Athlete of the Year for 2020

High school athletes are rarely the first to wear their respective jersey numbers for their school. Jersey numbers are passed down through the seasons and, eventually, generations.

For the last 12 years, Staley football coach Phil Lite has made it a point to tell his players about certain people who came before them — some of the special predecessors who chose to wear those same numbers for Staley High.

This year, he can add another to that list: No. 50, worn by a man of few words, Hayden Gregg.

“We talk about that jersey, that jersey that says ‘Staley’ on the front of it, what that means, and understand that there’s people that came before you and there will come people after you and understand that you represent an entire community,” Lite said. “He’s done a fantastic job representing Staley Nation. He definitely left that jersey in a better place than where he found it.”

Gregg spent most of his high school career knowing what he was good at: math, science and football.

“He always told us to leave it better than we found it,” Hayden Gregg said, “and I tried to do that. I always tried to be positive.”

Gregg was positive in the simplest ways. He kept his head down and led by example. He would “grind out” his daily schoolwork in class instead of stressing about it after practice. He “coached” his teammates alone rather than in front of a group. More than once, Lite watched Gregg pull younger players over to the side and share knowledge with them one-on-one.

For these attributes and more, Gregg is The Star’s Male Scholar-Athlete of the Year for 2020.

Gregg was a three-sport athlete for the Falcons, earning three varsity letters each in football, wrestling, and track and field as a discus thrower. But his list of accomplishments extends beyond multiple first-team accolades across three sports. He qualified for state in wrestling and discus. In football, he was a first team All-Simone selection and a 2019 Simone Buck Buchanan finalist, an award honoring the top big-class lineman or linebacker in the KC Metro.

But his most memorable play on the football field came when he wasn’t even playing his natural position.

Late in the third quarter against Park Hill on Oct. 18, Gregg was filling in for an injured teammate on special teams. He stepped in to try to block a punt. And he did. Gregg dove and blocked it while down on one knee; a teammate picked up the ball and scored.

That play sparked a comeback. After trailing 10-0 for most of the game, the Falcons went on to beat Park Hill 13-10.

“Just talking about it gives me goosebumps,” Lite said.

Leading by example

Gregg’s ability to step up in a critical moment is one of the many characteristics that make him a leader, Lite said. Instead of always vocalizing his thoughts, Lite said, Gregg led mostly by example.

Though he’s going to college to study engineering and play football, Gregg was a versatile athlete for the Falcons, excelling in multiple sports.

After one season of baseball in his freshman year, Gregg decided to quit and focus on wrestling and football — the two sports in which he’d participated since the first grade. Gregg’s father, Heath, said his son was a ball of energy from the moment he was born. He and his wife, Debbie, signed Hayden up for as many activities as possible.

Wrestling became his winter sport of choice after football ended. In Gregg’s rookie year, he placed second at state.

“He’s always been one that’s blessed with natural athletic ability,” Debbie said. “Whatever he’s done, he’s always done pretty well. He’s always been a physical, athletic kid.”

As spring season approached during his sophomore year, and with turning out for baseball now just a memory, Heath and Taylor coaxed Gregg into trying track and field — specifically, the discus. Gregg’s sister, who is 18 months older, was also a thrower.

“He started off, and he couldn’t throw the thing worth a darn,” Heath Gregg said. “Next thing I know, last year, he goes to state — places second at his sectional — and they had him ranked fourth or fifth going into state as a junior.”

Gregg completed his high school career with a 3.985 unweighted grade-point average after taking multiple advanced-placement and honors courses throughout his four years at Staley — most of which were math- and science-related. Studying wasn’t an issue for the two-time academic all-state honoree, unless it was for an English course. Still, he challenged himself to take AP English classes.

He had some interest in Ivy League schools like Harvard and Brown, but Gregg knew after visiting Colorado School of Mines in Golden, Colo., that this was where he could successfully pursue the engineering career he wanted while continuing to play a sport he loved.

Gregg said he’s always been a math and science guy but credits Shane Taylor, his first physics teacher and discus coach, with showing him how math and science — subjects that always came easily for him — could be applied to real-life scenarios and used in a job.

Taylor has been a physics teacher for 28 years and said he’s seen a lot of students with a knack for physics come through his class.

“You’d like to pat yourself on the back and say, ‘Yeah, it’s because of my class,’ but honestly, he was probably going to do that anyway,” Taylor said. “I like to think that some kids are just wired that way — some kids just think along the lines of physics and engineering, and that’s kind of how he is.

“He’s pretty analytical and very detail-oriented.”

‘Quiet, unassuming’

Taylor and Gregg grew close over the years, but in the classroom, Taylor couldn’t get Gregg to talk very much. Over the course of one school year, Taylor pried about 10 words out of him during his Honors Physics class.

Looking back, Taylor appreciates that about Gregg.

“If you get to talk to him and get a conversation going with him, you can tell how smart he really is, but you will never find that out unless you get to that level,” Taylor said. “ That’s one of the best things about him: He’s just quiet, unassuming.”

Heath said the same thing about his son. Hayden’s penchant for deep thought could be viewed as a blessing or a curse, depending on how one viewed it. Because Gregg was such a soft-spoken leader, Heath said, some see that as a lack of attention.

“You may not think he’s listening, but it’s getting in there because he’s a thinker,” Heath said. “Sometimes coaches take that the wrong way, but I think once coaches get to know Hayden, they realize that’s kind of the way he is. He’s quiet. He doesn’t say a whole lot.”

Lite never mistook it. He saw Gregg’s demeanor in the weight room and on the field.

His dad noticed Gregg’s leadership at team events away from Friday night games. Before every Thursday night team meal, Gregg said a prayer in front of his teammates.

Gregg’s leadership extended to his academic pursuits, too. He was an active member of the Fellowship for Christian Athletes at Staley for four years. He was also a member of the National Honor Society as well as Junior Assembly and the HowToLife Movement.

Gregg was well-known for both his academic involvement and athletic success at a school filled with more than 1,500 students. Lite said he wasn’t the quote “popular kid,” but he always had the respect of his teachers and peers.

“You couldn’t write a better story for a young man,” Lite said. “He’s one of the finest that ever walked the halls of Staley High School.

This story was originally published June 7, 2020 at 5:00 AM.