Ask any of her coaches, and they will all tell you the same thing.

Inglemoor High junior Taylor Peacocke is the most competitive athlete they have ever worked with in their careers.

“I have never coached anyone who wants to win more than she does,” said John Augustavo, head coach of the Viking girls basketball team. “She will do anything and everything possible to win, and she will work as hard as she can to make it happen.”

That competitive fire began in her youth, as the middle sibling of three sandwiched between two brothers.

“I’ve always been competitive with them,” said Peacocke of her brothers. “I bring that onto the court and the field. I don’t like to lose.”

She continued to beat up on the boys, playing Little League baseball until she was in sixth grade and forced to switch to fastpitch softball in seventh grade.

“I had to switch because Little League was over, and the boys started getting bigger,” Peacocke reminisced with a laugh.

This year, she excelled as a two-sport star in basketball and fastpitch, leading the Vikings into the Kingco playoffs averaging 17.9 points per game last winter, good for second in the league, and hitting a torrid .558 this spring for a young Viking team.

All the while, Peacocke excelled in the classroom, taking a rigorous course load including one International Baccalaureate (IB) math class while holding a 3.94 grade-point average.

For her leadership in both athletics and academics during her junior year at Inglemoor High, Peacocke has been named the Reporter’s Female Athlete of the Year.

RUNNING THE COURT

Basketball was Peacocke’s first love, ever since she first set foot on a court at age 4 at the local YMCA, playing on select and club teams ever since, as well as the Northshore Youth Basketball Association.

This year, she was slotted into the point-guard role, a slight change to the shooting-guard role she had been accustomed to in the past.

But the new position ended up fitting Peacocke’s leadership role perfectly.

“It was fine, because I was the ‘voice’ of the court and got to decide which plays to run, and when,” Peacocke recalled. “I’ve gotten better at it, but there’s a lot of new skills that you have to develop – ball handling, court vision, things that you can’t teach a kid, they have to have it naturally.”

Although the Vikings had their postseason run end in the Kingco Tournament with a 66-53 loss to Eastlake, Peacocke left a deep impression on the program for the second straight year, earning back-to-back first-team all-Kingco honors, and a season full of memories.

Early in the year, the Vikings surprised many by routing Kentwood, a powerhouse program, 59-39.

While Peacocke says that was her most memorable moment from the basketball season, it was hard to forget her clutch shot that led to a win over Northshore rival Bothell, on the Cougars’ home court.

“My best memory from last season was the 3-pointer against Bothell,” said Augustavo. “With the clock running out, (that shot) tied the game and put it into overtime.”

Peacocke eventually went on to score a season-high 34 points in that game, leading the Vikings to a double-overtime 56-47 win in the first contest of the new year.

SUPER SHORTSTOP

On the softball diamond, Peacocke originally started at third base, but moved over to shortstop, a more “natural” position for her athleticism and range – and has been robbing opponents of base hits ever since.

“Taylor loves to dive into the hole to make the great play at shortstop,” noted longtime head fastpitch coach Jeff Skelly. “She did this over and over… she loves to be in situations where the game is on the line and she has a chance to make a difference.”

As good as she was on defense, Peacocke was even better at the plate.

She ended up fourth in batting average in the league with her .558 average, which included six home runs and a 1.023 slugging percentage.

On a team with no seniors, and with Peacocke only having one prior year of experience with Inglemoor fastpitch, she was faced with the daunting task of being elected one of the team’s captains.

While she led by example with her hard-nosed defense and incredible offensive numbers, she noted that it took some time to earn the respect of her peers as an underclassman leader.

“It took a while, but after enough teaching and progress with the team, we started to come together,” Peacocke said. “They started to respect us a lot more.”

Peacocke admitted she enjoys the intensity of fastpitch, and the fact that no lead is safe, particularly in the competitive Kingco league.

Case in point was their Kingco playoff opener against Redmond, back on May 17.

Down 7-0 in their final at-bat, the Vikings came alive, stringing together base hits and closing the gap, all with two outs.

Eventually, in one of the oddest plays of the season, the team scored the winning run without even laying a bat on the ball.

“We had the bases loaded and I was on second, and our other captain was on first,” Peacocke recounted. “There was a passed ball, so the runner from third stole. I stole from second to home, and (Redmond) was not really paying attention, so the girl on first base stole. We cleared the bases on one passed ball.”

In helping her achieve great things as a prep athlete, the two-sport star wanted to give a shout out to her parents, coaches and one special mentor in particular who is no longer around.

“My coach from Inglemoor Select basketball, and the JV coach (at the school), James Rose,” Peacocke said. “He passed away about two years ago, so I always wear his initials on my arm when I play basketball.”

Looking ahead to next year, one of Peacocke’s primary goals is to get signed by a collegiate basketball program, and keep the tradition of excellence in prep sports going for future Vikings.

“My goals are to make everyone else around me better, really be a leader and a good voice,” she said. “Help the people coming up understand what Inglemoor sports are all about. For their senior year, they can teach that and keep it going down the years.”