Hendershot to be Inducted Into Hall of Fame

The BYU Athletic Department will be inducting five former athletes and one former broadcaster into its Hall of Fame on Friday evening. Former student-athlete inductees include Olympians Guard Wayne Young (men’s gymnastics) and Anu Kaljurand (women’s track and field), All-Americans Oswald “Ossie” Antonetti (men’s volleyball) and Maren Hendershot McCrary (women’s soccer) and record-holder Larry Carr (football). Former Electronic Media Relations Director and Cougar sports broadcaster Jay Monsen will also be inducted.

The induction ceremony will take place at 8 p.m. in the Cougar Room at LaVell Edwards Stadium.

Maren Hendershot McCrary

Women’s Soccer

Three-time All-American women’s soccer player Maren Hendershot McCrary took BYU’s motto of “Enter to Learn, Go Forth to Serve” to heart after graduating from the university with a degree in Communications and a minor in P.E./Coaching in 2000.

McCrary is now the girls’ varsity head coach at Bellevue West High School in Nebraska and a youth girls’ coach for the Phoenix Soccer Club where she has the opportunity to influence young soccer players.

While at BYU from 1996 to 2000, McCrary (then Hendershot) played in a total of 95 games, taking 277 shots and netting 52 goals. Her 52 career goals is still the second highest in BYU soccer history.

BYU was still a part of the Western Athletic Conference during McCrary’s freshman, sophomore and junior years, with the Cougar soccer program at the forefront. In those three final years with the WAC, the Cougars consistently had a 19+ win season with McCrary’s freshman season still holding BYU’s longest winning streak of 14 games.

McCrary was named to the WAC First Team three years in a row. In 1999, after the birth of Mountain West Conference, she was named to the MWC First Team. After scoring 14 goals her senior season, McCrary was also named an NSCAA All-American and invited to play in the Adidas summer league.

As a major asset to BYU’s dominant transition to the MWC, McCrary was acknowledged as a two-time All-Tournament MVP in her junior and senior seasons, and the MWC Player of the Year after just one year of play in the new conference.

In the year following her graduation from BYU, McCrary played in the Division I East/West Senior All-Star Game and was drafted by the Carolina Courage to play in the 2001 inaugural season of the Women’s United Soccer Association, which has since evolved into the Women’s Professional League in operation today.

McCrary continues her service to her community by hosting free soccer clinics to introduce soccer to kids and adults who are new to the game, participating in D.A.R.E. and children’s literacy programs, playing in the Mia Hamm Cancer Fundraiser charity game and directing dozens of youth soccer camps in different states.

McCrary and her husband Josh, a current U.S. Air Force pilot stationed at Offutt AFB, live in Bellevue, Nebraska, with their two children Cumorah Cathryn, 3, and Jordan Calai, 1. McCrary says she enjoys her full-time job as a mother and part-time job coaching soccer.