Campbellsville University senior Conleigh Wilson balances golf, dance and academics while preparing for life after college.
“I have been dancing since I was two,” she said. “I trained at my local studio, SKYDC in Franklin, Kentucky. When you graduate high school, you also graduate from the studio. My dance teacher, Kristin Hickman, has truly made me the dancer I am today.”
While dance has been a lifelong passion, golf came later.
“I grew up traveling and watching my brother, Chase, play, and at first it honestly seemed kind of boring,” Wilson said. “But in seventh grade, that changed, and that’s when I started playing. From then on, I played on the high school team all the way through graduation.”
Her passion for golf led her to CU where she signed to play on the women’s golf team on a scholarship. Wilson spent her entire freshman year focusing on golf, but she felt like something was missing.
After talking to CU Dance Coach Laura Day, she was able to find what was missing.
“During my second year, I decided to also join the dance team,” she said. “I really missed dance, and Laura gave me the opportunity to come back to it. Balancing both was a little stressful at first, but once I got into a routine, it actually became pretty manageable.”
This decision made Wilson a dual-sport athlete in dance and golf, requiring her to balance both sports, classes, her mental health, sleep and her relationships. Although schedules rarely conflicted, the demands still presented challenges.
“The biggest challenge is making sure I’m devoting the right amount of time to so I can be the best athlete I can be. I believe anything worth doing is worth doing well,” she said. “I never want to step onto the dance floor or the golf course without feeling prepared and confident.”
Her attitude and organization have not gone unnoticed by her coaches.
“Conleigh is very organized and stays on top of her schedule,” said Day. “In order to do two sports on top of school is a lot of work but because she manages her schedule well and communicates with both sets of coaches and her professors, she is able to make it work well.”
Committing fully to both sports means making sacrifices and carefully managing her priorities.
“Golf and dance are a huge part of who I am,” Wilson said. “I think both have given me a strong work ethic. They have overlapped at times. There have been moments where I’ve had to devote more time to one over the other depending on the season and what’s coming up. I’ve missed dance practices for golf tournaments, and I’ve even missed a golf tournament before because it was nationals’ season for dance. At CU, both golf and dance are year-round, so finding that balance is something I’ve had to learn.”
CU golfer Priya Latchayya has been teammates with Wilson for three years. She describes Wilson as a well-rounded athlete.
“She’s doing a great job balancing both sport and it make me respect her more,” Latchayya said. “Not just because she’s doing both but because she’s excelling in both.”
Wilson recently competed at nationals in Orlando, Florida, earned Academic All-Conference honors, and posted an 81.6 scoring average over 16 rounds during the 2024–25 season.
“I used to dance before college for most of my life and when I started golfing, I had to give up dance because it became too much,” Latchayya said. “This is why I see what she’s doing as very impressive because I know she must be exhausted after the kind of dedication she gives.”
Looking ahead, Wilson will graduate a year early in May 2026 with a Bachelor of Science in business administration, with an emphasis in marketing.
“I’ve been accepted into CU’s graduate program, so I’ll be continuing both my education and athletic career there,” she said. “I still have eligibility left so one more year for golf and two for dance.”
