Notre Dame’s Grayson Maurer signs with Army Track & Field

CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. (KFVS) - Only a fraction of athletes go Division 1. Even fewer students attend service academies.

That’s what makes Notre Dame’s Grayson Maurer such an impressive story.

Maurer, a senior at Notre Dame High School, signed with the U.S. Military Academy on Thursday, February 19, for track & field. For the Army, Maurer will compete in the triple jump and potentially the long jump.

This summer, Maurer will make the 1000+ mile journey to West Point, New York. She’ll join her fellow fourth-class cadets or “plebes” for Cadet Basic Training, an intense introduction to non-civilian life in the Army.

“It is going to be very different,” Maurer said on joining the Army. “For basic, we don’t get to talk to our family for like six weeks, and that’s going to be hard because my parents are like some of my best friends.”

Maurer originally wasn’t thinking about joining a service academy. But the turning point was when she got mail expressing interest in her potentially being an athlete on the Army’s track & field team.

From there, Maurer pursued the option pretty heavily, something her high school track & field coach at Notre Dame, Ryan Long, noted.

Long noted that he hadn’t recalled an NDHS student going to the Army in a long time, much less also competing in a sport while there.

Maurer also spoke on a visit she took to West Point in 2025, a big reason why she felt inclined to go to the Army.

“When you woke up at 5:30 a.m. and stood in the stands for a five-hour game, it definitely showed you what you were actually going to be doing, not sugar-coating, which made it that much cooler,” Maurer said, reflecting on a football weekend on campus.

Maurer will major in economics at the academy.