All-State Boys Track: Sals' Hally finds his passion

Achieving statewide dominance of middle distance races with the leadership style he shows at school, Andrew Hally was named Delaware’s outstanding male indoor track athlete by the state’s high school track coaches.

Hally anchored two relay teams to state records, led Salesianum to the state championship – winning two events in a three-event marathon – and became the state’s second fastest indoor two-miler ever. He earned the sport’s outstanding performer honor in a season when sprinter Ja’saan Cunningham of Glasgow and jumper Malachi Davis of Mount Pleasant were also two-event state champions.

An energetic personality and outstanding student at the center of his school’s civic life, Hally is anything but a slacker. Yet, for nearly half his high school career, his efforts in track were desultory.

“In my freshman and sophomore years, I didn’t even really want to do track. I wasn’t putting in the work,” Hally said. “Once I started to put in the work and see the results I fell in love with the sport. Now I can’t even imagine my life without it.”

The state marveled at the running of another Hally, his brother Patrick, who was the state’s top cross country runner in 2013, when Andrew, a sophomore, was the ninth man on Salesianum’s junior varsity.

Any younger sibling will understand. “I think it was because in my freshman and sophomore years I wanted to be as far away from my brother as possible,” Andrew Hally said. “I wanted to create my own legacy, be my own person.”

A mentor stepped in. “Sophomore year, one of my coaches challenged me,” Hally said. Kevin Moore, who now teaches at Malvern, “said that I had so much talent but was wasting it. That struck home with me,” recalled Hally, who initially stewed after the intervention.

“For the first couple of days, I just wanted to quit the sport. Then, it really sunk in that he had a point. I could really be so much better if I only put in the work. He pushed me to find within myself that extra drive, that motivation to get the runs done,” says Hally. “It was a change within myself. I wanted to be the best.”

No longer running just five days a week, Hally qualified that spring for the Meet of Champions in the 1600 meters. That fall in cross country, he vaulted to first team, All-State.

“Pat and Andrew trained together all summer. That training turned around his running career,” said Salesianum coach Joe Gioffre, an All-State runner in 1998 and member of the history department, who was named the state’s coach of the year.

“I realized that I was fine to be like my brother, because he’s a great role model and support,” says Hally, an aspiring economics student who has chosen to attend Penn, so that he can run with Patrick, an engineering major.

Last spring, Hally became the state’s ninth sub-4:15 miler and seventh sub-9:15 two-miler. In the New Castle County meet, he won the 3200 meters on Friday and the next day went 4:14.8, in the deepest field ever assembled in a 1600-meter race, won by Kieran Tuntivate in a record 4:11.71.

“It was the day after the prom. My legs were feeling terrible, because I’m a big dancer. I was dancing all night. I told Pat, ‘I’ll try to break 4:25.’ That meet opened up my new perspective on the sport and had me more motivated than ever.”

In cross country, he won the Salesianum and Killens invitationals, and was second in the county and state meets to Charter’s Kevin Murray, who set course records in each. In the Southeast Regionals, Hally picked off several dozen runners in the final mile to finish 17th in the 12-state competition.

After a week of rest, he began his three-event winter assault on the record board, in a season comprised entirely of elite invitationals, all out of state, beginning in December with a 4:21:8 mile, ninth best in state history, at the Bishop Loughlin Games.

Hally began a torrid January by annihilating a New York field at the Hispanic Games in the two mile, winning by eight seconds in 9:19.9, within one second of Stephen Garrett’s state record.

“If I had known, I think I could have picked up the one or two seconds but it’s not all about the records. It’s about having fun and seeing what you can do and being proud of yourself.”

At the Yale Track Classic, he became an all-time leader in yet a third event, running the 800 in 1:58.3, becoming the tenth Delaware boy ever to break 1:59. That night, he anchored the Sentinels’ winning distance medley relay team in 10:24.6. He, John Walker, Colin Parker and George Steinhoff broke a record that had been held by four sets of Tatnall runners over 10 years.

The conditions in New Haven weren’t ideal. “We didn’t know where to go for lunch. We couldn’t find anything healthy, so we had greasy fast food,” says Hally. “The four of us just looked at each other while we were eating burgers and fries and wondered what we could do.”

The foursome set a state 4x800 record (8:06.49) a week later at the Ocean Breeze Invitational in Staten Island, lowering the year-old standard set by Hally, Parker, Walker and Tom Higley.

The quartet sought no records in the state meet, a compressed half-day gauntlet, instead seeking an accumulation of points. Led by Hally, the four together outscored every other school in the state, finishing 1-2-3 in the 800 and 1600, then 2-3-4 behind Murray in the 3200.

“We’re more than a team. It’s more of a family experience,” Hally said.

A member of the Student Council Board, Hally captained Salesianum’s state champion LifeSmarts team, in competition sponsored by the National Consumers League that focuses on personal finance, environment, health and technology. He is also a leader in the school’s Interact Club, dedicated to community service.

“You need to give back to the community,” Hally said. “It’s what I love most about Sallies. Helping the community and doing service helps you grow as a person. You make impact on other peoples lives and you meet people who you wouldn’t have met.”