Whitney Boggus
Class of 2026
Whitney Smith Boggus could have played any number of sports in college.
She was a very good shooting guard on the basketball team at Grissom High School. She also could have played softball, where she played second base for the Tigers for two years and was the mascot her senior year.
In the end, however she became an All-American bowler at Alabama A&M.
How did that happen? Here’s what she has to say about it.
“I started bowling when I was about six years old,” she recalls. “My grandad ‘Pop’ (Mel Webb), started taking me to Redstone Lanes. While I played other sports, bowling was always there and I’m thankful for Pop and my parents for always making sure I got to each game and practice.
“Around my junior year in high school, I realized there were scholarship opportunities in bowling, and I began to pursue that.”
Little did she know that A&M bowling coach Jeff McCorvey was already pursuing her.
“Jeff knew of me from growing up in Huntsville,” she says. “He watched me play basketball in a game against Huntsville and felt like I would be a good fit.”
In the end, she turned out to be a great fit.
She became the most accomplished bowler in the history of A&M’s program. And as a result of that, she is going into the Huntsville-Madison County Athletic Hall of Fame, one year after McCorvey, her former coach, was inducted.
“It’s a great honor to be included in this class,” she says. “I grew up in Huntsville my entire life. I played with (current HOF inductee) Stephanie Pinto grew up with (current HOF inductee) David Bell’s kids. I played and coached with Tanya (Wigley) Broadway and Connie Stephens just to name a few. There are many others that are a part of this great Hall of Fame that have made an impact on my life.
“I would never have imagined that bowling would lead me down these roads because it wasn’t a popular sport at the time. The decision to focus on bowling opened a world of opportunities I never knew existed. Going to A&M was the best decision I’ve ever made. I decided to go with it and see where it goes. A&M is a great place and the sports programs rallied around each other.”
How good was she?
She was named the Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC) Rookie of the Year in 2005 and went on to become a four-time All-SWAC First Team selection and was named SWAC Player of the Year in 2007.
Nationally, she was recognized three times as an NTCA All-American, which only solidified her place as one of the all-time great collegiate bowlers.
She holds a slew of records at A&M, including marks for career pinfall, career games played, single-season scoring average, career scoring average, and multiple high-series records.
Perhaps, her finest hour came in the 2006 NCAA Women’s Bowling Championship when she helped A&M defeat two-time defending national champion Nebraska, where she earned All-Tournament Team honors.
Nebraska had been her dream school in high school.
“We were the last seed (eighth) and we had to beat Nebraska,” she says. “We were down to the tenth frame in the last match and one of their girls struggled and I had to make three straight strikes for us to win and fortunately I was able to come through that game.”
While the Bulldogs knocked off Nebraska, they fell in the championship game to Fairleigh Dickinson.
“The match against Nebraska was so tight, and it took all we had to get through it,” she says. “We gave it all we had. It was a great experience. One of the things I remember most is that we had great team chemistry.”
While she excelled at bowling, having her jersey number retired at A&M in 2010, becoming the first bowler in school history to achieve that honor, she also excelled as a coach.
She has experience coaching volleyball, basketball, softball, bowling and in 2018 Boggus led the Buckhorn High School boys’ team to a bowling state championship.
Boggus served as a teacher and coach at Grissom early in her career, then went to Buckhorn High School in 2013 and became assistant principal in 2017. Currently, she is still making her mark in education, serving as an assistant principal at Gulf Shores Middle School since 2024.
-- Reggie Benson
