Coaches and teammates around the Mobile area have started saying the quiet part out loud: Saraland High School’s Morgan Davis may be headed to the Olympics one day. It is not hyperbole from people who watched her career up close — it is the conclusion of years of record-setting performances that culminated in one of the most dominant prep track and field careers the region has ever seen.
Davis closed out her high school career with 56 individual event titles and 13 state championships, numbers that put her at the top of any list of great Mobile-area track athletes. Along the way she set a state meet record of 20 feet, 8½ inches in the long jump and became the first female athlete in Alabama history to clear six feet in the high jump as a senior, a mark that tied her for No. 1 nationally that season.
“I look forward to turning on the TV one day and seeing Morgan on the SEC, outdoor national championship and the Olympics,” Saraland coach Matt Dearmon said. “I definitely believe she’ll be competing for our country one day.”
Davis’s rise did not begin at Saraland. Tony Guardalabene, now an assistant principal at Semmes Middle School, coached her as a seventh-grader and remembers a volleyball player who decided, almost on a whim, to try the high jump.
“It’s not a pipe dream, this is a fact — she’ll make the Olympic team,” Guardalabene said. “She had never high-jumped before but wound up clearing five feet. At the time, she was playing club volleyball and she said she wanted to get better and put in the extra work.”
By the time she reached Saraland, Dearmon said he had already been warned about the talent headed his way by Semmes Middle School coach Michael Spriggs. “I knew she was a really good jumper when she high-jumped five feet in middle school and she was hitting 19 feet in the long jump as a freshman, which is almost unheard of,” Dearmon said. “I felt the first time I was able to see her perform, she could be Division I material.”
Guardalabene believes Davis’s sophomore-year marks would have been good enough to win the Sun Belt Conference meet outright and finish third at the NCAA Championships in the high jump — while she was still in high school.
Davis backed up the praise with results. She was named the Mobile Optimist Club’s Class 6A Female Track and Field Athlete of the Year three years running, in 2021, 2022 and 2023, and was the Mobile Challenge of Champions’ female MVP in back-to-back years. In her senior season she went undefeated in the 100-meter dash across 11 races, won eight of nine 200-meter races, and did not lose in either the long jump or the high jump. As a junior, she was undefeated in the long jump and 200, lost only once in the 100, and still walked away the state champion in all three events. Her middle school résumé was similarly spotless: 36 victories at Semmes and an unbeaten record in the long jump and high jump.
“I always said she was dominant but she still feels like she’s not good,” said Mashaunda Dixon, who coached Davis during summer track season and now leads Foley’s girls track and field program. “I’ve been knowing Morgan for five or six years and what impressed me was her drive and competitive nature.”
The path to that dominance included a detour. Davis was also an accomplished volleyball player, but the COVID-19 pandemic wiped out her freshman volleyball season at Saraland, pushing her to focus fully on track — a decision that, in hindsight, changed the trajectory of her career.
She also did things few competitors could match technically. Aaron Moore, a St. Paul’s assistant who coached Davis during summer track, recalled watching her take off on her right foot in the long jump and her left foot in the high jump. “I’ve never seen that before,” Moore said. “It’s highly unusual. When I approached her about it, she asked me if she should change it and I told her no. She’s strong with both legs and if she was permitted to compete in five events at the state meet, the triple jump would be that event.”
Her high jump development was especially notable given she had taken a two-year break from the event after her freshman year at Saraland. “Coming out of middle school, she was good,” Dixon said. “When she told me she was high-jumping again, I was really excited.” Guardalabene remembered her needing work on her arch technique but still clearing 5-10 — enough for him to tell her mother and Dearmon, “There’s a girl who’s going to be an SEC champion.”
The record-breaking senior season built toward its peak at the state meet. Dearmon recalled Davis clearing 5-4 in her very first senior-year practice, a sign the coaching staff needed to start building a plan. “We started looking at the high-jump record and started developing a plan for the state meet,” he said. “We would have her try and clear 5-10, then 5-10½ and then six feet.” Weather delays that wiped out qualifying in the 200 gave Davis extra rest, and she used it to clear six feet at the state meet, setting the state record. “I think I jumped up in the air and yelled when she cleared six feet and got the record,” Dearmon said.
The performance, combined with her wins in the 100 and 200 and her record long jump, earned Davis national recognition — SBLive Sports named her its Female Athlete of the Week. “If she didn’t have to run the 200, she would’ve cleared 6-1,” Guardalabene said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she gets Gatorade Track and Field Athlete of the Year nationally. She’s a hard worker and will do whatever it takes to improve.”
Moore said Davis’s success has raised the profile of track and field across the Mobile area, inspiring a new wave of athletes to chase her marks, including St. Paul’s Janie Ford, Baker’s Myla Reed, Foley’s Destiny Roper, UMS-Wright’s Charles Perry, Vigor’s Jerrian Graham and Saraland teammate Ryan Williams. “Other athletes, I think they have the utmost respect for her,” Moore said. “Athletes like Roper and Reed, I see them looking up to Morgan. It’s like they’re running against her and say, ‘If I get closer to her, then I’m doing better.'”
Davis will take her talents to the University of Kentucky, where those who coached her believe she is only scratching the surface of what she can accomplish. “I’m always amazed by her,” Moore said. “She has not reached her maximum potential at all. Kentucky’s getting a gem because to go six feet in the high jump and not being her primary event, that’s amazing.”
For a region that has produced plenty of standout athletes but few Olympic-caliber talents, Davis represents a rare case where the ceiling genuinely appears to be as high as the coaches around her believe.