By Thomas Sellers Jr.
As March 31 approached on the campus of Millington Central Middle High School, a few in the know knew all the facts about Micaiah Halliburton’s future.
Christian Brothers University being her future college home was known as family, friends, classmates, administrators, city of Millington dignitaries and members of The WORD Church filed into the Millington Performing Arts Center, But which sport would Micaiah be signing for at CBU.
Will the All-Region defender be taking her soccer talents to the Lady Bucs? Or the Ms. Basketball nominee would be playing hoops the next four years at CBU?
Maybe the sport that introduced Micaiah to competitive athletics, track, might get the nod as her collegiate extracurricular activity.
“She was about 5 or 6, we were at a church picnic and she was running the track,” Micaiah’s dad Benjamin recalled. “She started picking up stuff from there.”
That day at then Emmanuel Baptist Church was the spark of Micaiah’s love of sports and paved the road to her signing at CBU for track.
“That same track event he’s talking about at the conference, she won a medal because she was only 5 or 6,” Barbara, the mother of Micaiah said. “She won the race and got the medal. I still have the picture of her with our Pastor holding her up with that medal. It was so exciting and I just knew she was going to be doing something.”
Micaiah’s hard work has landed her several individual athletic wards, team success and high honors in the classroom. After a decorated prep career, the big sister of BJ Halliburton had multiple offers in all three sports.
“After seeing all the work she’s done and through the complaining, the early burnouts and the late burnouts, both of us pushed her,” Benjamin said. “Her mom pushed her a lot not only to compete on the field but in class too. It’s good to see her come to this point.”
Barbara noted all the financial, spiritual and time investment in her daughter was validated through the determination of Micaiah.
“It’s amazing because I think she just has an inner drive that I can’t really put a name on it,” she said. “Even through the tiredness and her being sore, all those things even sometimes we were like ‘If you want to take a break?’ But she just couldn’t take that break.
“She was determined to keep going,” Barbara added. “Even if she considered it, it was for a very short time. She just has an inner drive. I can’t name where it came from. It’s just inner motivation that is God-given.”
Entering high school Micaiah had a reputation as a talented athlete playing basketball and competing at State in track.
“I wanted to make a difference because I knew before entering here the track program was on a low,” Micaiah said. “So I wanted to be that difference and work my hardest to show I can change things for the program.”
With her primary sport coming up the spring of 2019, Micaiah got a crash course in high school sports that started August 2018. She was thrusted into prep soccer as an offensive starter. Then within days she was the starting point guard as a freshman for the Lady Trojans Basketball team.
“No I never wanted to quit because I love all the sports and I wanted to be active,” Micaiah recalled. “There was never a reason to quit.”
The next year Micaiah’s expectation increased, now a starter on the Millington Soccer defense and first-year Lady Trojan Head Basketball Coach Nic Buford gave her the keys to run the show on the court.
“It was hard and I did have some of those nights where I was rethinking about it. I had to talk to my parents to stay there,” Micaiah said. “It was just hard because I had to change my position. I made up my mind to take whatever it comes to me and just try to roll with it. It’s going to be better in the end.”
Barbara noted she witnessed her daughter reach a new level of maturity around that time.
“It was a reflection point for her to be able to kind of figure out what was in her to be able to push through,” she said. “She did hit a little bit of a wall her 10th grade year. Particularly in basketball because she was being asked to take on a bigger role as a point guard. It was a role she really didn’t want. It fell to her because she was the best ball handler on the team with the best vision. But she really didn’t want that responsibility. It was hard for her to look within to say ‘I can make it through this.’
“Of course we are Bible-believing Christians, we always talking about scripture,” Barbara continued. “We’re always pouring God into her, encouragement and motivation. She had to pull on that to be able to get past that wall. Once she was able to do that it was nothing but going up from there.”
Up was the direction for Micaiah. Everything Micaiah touched had a golden polish by the time it was done. The Lady Trojan Soccer team won district and Regional championships. Her senior year, Halliburton scored a crucial goal and used her District Defensive Player of the Year skills to help Millington host its first Sectional game.
On the hardwood Millington was back at the Regional Semifinals after a 10-year absence. Halliburton was dropping 20 a game and being named All-Region.
Now in her last track season, Halliburton’s goal is to reach State after back-to-back Sectional appearances.
“Pushing her and encouraging her to do the work,” Benjamin said, was a key to signing day. “‘Work hard now and play later.’ Whatever you put in you’re going to get out of it.”
Benjamin used reverse psychology, financial bonuses or flat out trash talking to keep his daughter going. He taught her a few lessons to make her mentally tougher in all three sports.
I will repeat one of the things my husband says and we drilled that into our kids from the time they were really young, ‘work now and play later,’” Barbara said. “Work now and you’ll have an opportunity later to reap the benefits. You play now and you’ll be working for a long time. It might be the rest of your life and that’s academically, financially, all around.
“Put in the work, put in the effort, put in the commitment and it pays back to you,” she added. “You just have to stay dedicated and have a long version. You have to play the long game and see beyond the now. It’s not about right now. Right now is just a moment. But you have to have the ability to look beyond that. And where you don’t have the ability, we as parents come in to help you see beyond the now.”
Micaiah’s future will be competing for CBU Head Track Coach Christina Fortenberry. She will also receive walk-on interest in basketball and soccer with the Lady Bucs.
“She had some other choices. Just getting her to make a decision she would be happy with,” Benjamin said. “There were so many pros CBU had that were perfect for us and overall. But she still had to make that decision.”
Micaiah said CBU won her heart because it felt like home.
“It’s a D-II school, great facility, outgoing coach,” she noted. “Closer to home, education is good and they seem to be really focused on education. The atmosphere, they care about her athletics and academics and know sports will come to an end one day.”
The three-sport Lady Trojan legend feels CBU will secure her professional future and allow her to create a few more sports memories. But the unfinished legacy of Halliburton at Millington has made her the face of Lady Trojans Athletics the past four years.
“If you just stay dedicated, you don’t let things break you and you have a goal in mind, if you stick to it and work hard it will pay off,” she said. “I can always trust in God and He’ll be there. My parents were there to push me and encourage me when times were hard.
“I feel like I am a good role model because I played three sports and maintained academics with it,” Halliburton concluded. “Three sports are the most you can play. Three is from the beginning to the end. If you set your mind to it and stay determined you can do it.”
