North Jersey Male Athlete of the Year writes a storybook ending to his high school career

Imagine trying lots of sports as a young boy, not really liking any of them and then finding something you like and you’re good at.

Then, at age 13, the sport you think is your athletic passion becomes too difficult to continue because you spend more time in physical therapy than in actual training. A global pandemic ensues and you spend much of the next year indoors.

You get to high school, find another sport that suits your talents and get very good fast. But then your body betrays you again, and you have to sit out another year before you can compete.

Your sister is a state champion in the same event you do and your father is your coach. Two years later you’re the state champion, too.

If you brought that script to a Hollywood producer, they’d laugh you out of the business.

Meet Owen Keating of Pompton Lakes. Every word of that story happened to him.

Keating, who survived a marathon six-round jumpoff to become Passaic County’s first boy to win the pole vault, grew up in an athletic family. His father, Steve was the Passaic County record holder in the pole vault from 1986 to 2003 and vaulted at Rutgers, where he met his wife, the former Anne Bansemeir, a multi-event star at Nutley who was an All-American in the pentathlon at RU.

Older brother Bryan also vaulted at Pompton Lakes, but was a better soccer player, playing four years at Rutgers before his recent graduation. And Emma, who just finished her sophomore year at Rutgers, won three SMOC pole vault titles, indoors in 2023 and outdoors in 2022 and 2023.

Owen, two years younger than Emma and five years behind Bryan, tried lots of sports as a youngster but liked none of them, joining Emma at gymnastics, where he seemed to find his niche.

“I was pretty good for a young kid and I spent a lot of time in the gym, but it’s a brutal sport and I could never stay healthy,” Owen said. “So during seventh grade, I just stopped.”

Soon after that, the COVID pandemic hit and Keating, like many, rarely left his house for a year.

He trailed Bryan, Emma and his dad to the famous Barn in Warwick, N.Y., the mecca for local pole vaulters, when it re-opened as the pandemic waned. He had never really vaulted but would, by his own admission, “mess around” and drink in the atmosphere, liking what he saw.

“I’d always known about vaulting because of my dad, and we had a metal pole in the backyard that I’d fool around with, but never really vaulted before,” he said “Now instead of a coach screaming at me because I didn’t point my toes right in gymnastics, the vaulters and coaches were helping each other get better and everything was positive. I liked that.”

So when he got to high school, after a fall running cross-country − “I got to run at states because our team was good” − he took up the vault in earnest.

He was an instant success, clearing 12-6 as a freshman, tops among ninth graders in the state and nearly joined his sister as a Passaic County champion. He finished third at New Balance Nationals at Franklin Field in Philadelphia in the freshman vault.

Then came a huge setback.

His ankles and legs began hurting him terribly and the verdict from doctors was clear. He’d have to shut it down for a year to allow him to grow into his body. It could have been crushing.

“But he waited and took up other things that allowed him to exercise without spending a lot of time on his feet,” said his dad, Steve. “He did a lot of rock climbing and it helped him develop his upper body.”

Most importantly, he learned the pole vault.

“I really knew nothing about the event before I started freshman year,” Owen said. “So I starting watching tapes of vaulting, went to the Barn and watched, read a lot about it and talked to my dad a lot.”

When he returned to the runway as a junior, it was as a veteran. A month after he started vaulting again, he cleared 15 feet to become Passaic County’s first vaulter over the height.

He went on to take third in both the state indoor and outdoor pole vault and last winter cleared 16-6, fourth highest in state history en route to winning the indoor title. He committed to Binghamton University, one of the top vaulting schools in the East and then sweated out his first ever jump-off, prevailing in the sixth round over Ed Frey of Cinnaminson to earn his own SMOC title.

“I attribute everything I have to both my parents for their never-ending support and saw my sister make a transition from gymnastics to vaulting so successfully,” he said. “I’m so glad I found pole vaulting.”