There was no physical bruise, but the mental damage had already started after Kristal McGreggor absorbed the haunting words from a high school teacher who once told her she would never become anything in life.
Those words dangled and swirled in McGreggor's mind for years, quietly shaping how she saw herself and how she moved through the world. Today, McGreggor, who has a doctorate in sports management, sits in a very different seat as a leader at Austin Peay, guiding student-athletes through conversations about confidence, culture and emotional intelligence that many of them have never had before.
A major turning point came through the NCAA's Dr. Charles Whitcomb Leadership Institute, along with other NCAA programs like the Effective Facilitation Workshop and the Student-Athlete Leadership Forum. Participating in these transformative opportunities forced McGreggor to confront the old narratives she'd internalized, clarify her core values, and shift from leading out of fear and a need for external validation to leading from a grounded, intentional place.
"Here was this one teacher who I looked up to, that I respected, that spoke this word over me, and I started to believe that," McGreggor said. "Leadership Institute and therapy helped me see where I was allowing an outside voice to shape who I was. I'd been leading from fear and uncertainty, looking for external validation. LI showed me that's not the way to lead."
That newfound clarity now shows up directly in her work.
McGreggor, who is the associate director of athletics for student-athlete success and strategic initiatives at Austin Peay, turned a recent spring break road trip with the track and field team into a mini leadership and cultural retreat. After asking her head coach what the team was struggling with, she built a series of nightly sessions around team culture, being a good teammate, confidence, emotional intelligence and identifying personal triggers. Each night ended with reflection and honest conversation.
McGreggor took the scenic route into athletics administration. Born and raised in Jamaica, she walked away from sports when she first came to the United States, planning to build a life working retail at Sears. A mentor's push sent her back to school at Bronx Community College, where she rediscovered track and field, walked onto the team and eventually earned a full scholarship to Hampton.
"I love to tell my students many times that my path to college athletics was nontraditional," McGreggor said. "LI really challenged me to stick to those morals and those values. It challenged me to really do the work and to see where I probably had missed the mark in the past — and then how do I learn from that?"
McGreggor understands the power of words because she lived under their weight. But she reclaimed her story, now defining herself by her values, not by others' limitations.
Away from the office, McGreggor is deliberate about protecting her peace, especially since she used to grind through 13-hour days regularly. Now, her reset often looks like playing "FIFA" on her PlayStation; bingeing "Chicago Med," "Chicago Fire," "Chicago PD" or "Yellowstone"; getting an early workout in; and starting each day with a Bible app devotion she shares with a small circle of friends growing out of the Student-Athlete Leadership Forum. They have become family, the kind who let her vent and then gently point out her blind spots, which keeps her grounded enough to show up fully for her student-athletes.
"(Leadership Institute) literally saved my life and helped me become a better person," McGreggor said. "Somebody shared, 'There's a lot of things that are going to be said over this week, but take what you need to become the better version of yourself.' That's what I did with LI. It wasn't always easy. Some days I didn't want to sit with the questions or do the reflection, but it was necessary and needed."
