Brian Ellis is sworn in as Mooresville police officer.

 

Brian Ellis, 1991

 

By Mike London
mike.london@salisburypost.com

SALISBURY —  From 1990 to 1992, it was hard to pick up a Salisbury Post sports section without seeing a photo of Brian Ellis smiling back at you.

Ellis was a high school phenom at North Rowan in those days, a national figure in track and field in the long and triple jumps.

The late coach Robert Steele frequently gave Ellis credit for triggering North Rowan’s resurgence in track and field in the 1990s. From 1990 to 2012, North’s boys were a dynasty. They would win five NCHSAA indoor track state championships and 11 outdoors. Ellis led the Cavaliers to those first two indoor titles in 1990 and 1991. He was the 1991 Gatorade Track Athlete of the Year for North Carolina.

The sixth class of the North Carolina High School Track & Field and Cross Country Hall of Fame was announced recently. That 10-person class includes Ellis. He’ll be the fourth North Rowan Cavalier to be honored at the state level. He’ll join Steele, fellow jumper Greg Yeldell and female superstar Latasha Pharr.

“This Hall of Fame election came out of the blue, but it’s an honor,” Ellis said. “It’s something that Coach Steele always wanted for me. He told me several times that my time would come, and I know he wanted it a lot more for me than I ever wanted it for myself. I never pursued track and field for accolades. I did it because I loved the competition and because I loved the friendships. But awards were never my motivation.”

Ellis switched from West Rowan to North Rowan in middle school. One of his best friends was Mike White, the basketball/football star who is now the principal at North Rowan. Ellis and White played basketball together for five years. Ellis wasn’t a superstar in basketball, but his track explosiveness made him a very good player. As a senior in 1991, he averaged 10.4 points for a 21-5 team that won the 3A South Piedmont Conference. He had huge games in the wins against Salisbury and Northwest Cabarrus and finished third on the team in scoring behind White and Josh Mills.

Ellis, the nephew of long-time track and field coach Ralph Ellis, had planned on playing baseball for coach Bill Kesler as a North freshman in the spring of 1988 and had his glove oiled up, but Steele talked him into giving track and field a try. The rest is history.

In 1990, NCHSAA indoor track had no classifications. It was open competition for everyone from 1A to 4A. Ellis won the triple jump.

In the spring of 1990, Ellis was the triple jump champion in the 3A State Championships, achieving a distance of 50 feet, 2.25 inches at N.C. State.

Ellis appeared in the Post for academic success in the summer of 1990. Cavaliers Ellis, White, Donnie Charleston, Emmanuel Barnes-Smith and Reginald Barnes-Smith were headed to Boys State. The Barnes-Smith brothers also were gifted track athletes, who competed on a very high level.

In July 1990, Ellis was named age group MVP for the second straight summer in the East Coast Classic Invitational in Maryland. He won gold medals in the triple and long jumps.

In August 1990, Ellis was the champion in the triple jump at the Junior Olympic Nationals in Florida.

In February 1991, Ellis led North to its second straight indoor track state title and was the meet MVP. He set meet records in the long jump (23-9.75) and triple jump (48-8.25).  That long jump record still stands, He even finished third in the 300 meters.

In April 1991, Ellis signed with Arizona State University. He was recruited by a long list of schools. He turned down Ohio State, Indiana, Clemson and N.C. State, among others.

“I’d gotten the travel bug from AAU track,” Ellis explained. I was excited about seeing a new part of the country, going somewhere far away.”

In the 1991 3A Outdoor State Championships, Ellis was sensational, as North finished as state runner-up for the second straight season. His triple jump of 52-1.5 broke the record not only for 3A, but for all state meets. He placed second in the long jump (24-7.75).

He kept the momentum going in AAU competition, winning the long and triple jumps against a national field in the Golden West Invitational in California. His long jump in the Golden West (25-6.5) was the best a Rowan County athlete had ever recorded.

Shortly after graduation, Ellis won the long jump and was third in the triple jump in the Keebler Invitational in Illinois, which had attracted an international field.

Two days after the meet in Illinois, Gatorade named Ellis North Carolina’s top track and field athlete for 1991.

In July 1991, Ellis wore the colors of Team USA, competing on the Junior Pan-American team. He won a gold medal in the triple jump in Spokane, Washington. Two weeks later, he competed with the Junior Pan-American team in Spain and produced a triple of jump of 53-2 for a silver medal.

“At that point, the Olympics were a realistic goal as long as I stayed healthy and kept developing,”  Ellis said. “The goal was the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.”

August 1991 brought national honors for Ellis. USA Today ranked him first nationally in the triple jump and third in the long jump. He was a member of the publication’s All-USA team. Also named All-Americans were Emmanuel Barnes-Smith and Salisbury sprinter Andre Steele.

Ellis continued to make progress as a freshman at Arizona State. He was honored as the track and field program’s outstanding freshman athlete after placing second in the long jump and third in the triple jump in the PAC-10 Championships. He missed qualifying for the Outdoor Nationals in the triple jump by less than an inch.

But health is everything and Ellis suffered his first serious injury during his freshman year. He landed wrong in the jumping pit, twisted his right knee and woke up with severe swelling.

He rehabbed and came back strong.

In July 1992, following his freshman year, he won triple jump gold in the USA Junior Track and Field Championships in Ohio with a leap of 53-2.25. He was mentally tough. He made that winning jump under pressure on his sixth and final jump.

Arizona State track and field coach Tom Jones had been the coach at N.C. State before he went to Arizona State. He’d known Ellis for years and had personally recruited him. Ellis was close to Jones, and when Jones left for Florida after his freshman year, that was a setback.

Jones was an expert in the jumps. His replacement was more of a running-oriented coach. Ellis considered transferring closer to home, but after several conversations with Steele and Ralph Ellis, he decided to stick it out at Arizona State.

Unfortunately, the injuries kept coming — to his knees, his hamstrings, his ankle. The ankle injury was severe enough to require surgery. He hit the wall as far as the distances on his leaps. He was still very good, he won a parade of PAC-10 meets and broke the school record in the triple jump in 1993, but greatness, Olympic-level greatness, was not to be.

“I look back on it and I know I did OK in college,” Ellis said modestly. “It was just short of what I had dreamed about doing.”

While his post-high school career wasn’t what it might have been, Ellis was really special — a two-time Track & Field News All-American, a Gatorade Track Athlete of the Year, a five-time individual state champion. The years go by, but his triple jump of 52 feet, 1.5 inches in 1991 is still the standard for NCHSAA state meets and one of the best of all-time.

Ellis, who was elected into the Salisbury-Rowan Hall of Fame in 2012, lives in Salisbury and works in Mooresville as a police officer.

A statewide committee of 22 track and field and cross country current and former coaches, officials and media representatives who cover the sport extensively nominated and elected the latest Hall of Fame class.

The induction ceremony will be held on Feb. 1 in Winston-Salem during the Mondo Elite High School Invitational at the JDL Fast Track. Each elected class has been honored at that meet, which is the premier indoor meet in North Carolina each season.