DETROIT (7/29/2020) – Carpe diem.
 
It was Andrea (Karpala) Humphrey's life's motto and did she ever live by it.
 
"Live life to the fullest every day, because you never know," Andrea's father Frank Karpala said recently in a phone interview. "She was full of quotes. She lived life to the fullest, every single day. At 34, she passed away, but she lived life."

The late women's track and field standout at the University of Detroit Mercy was honored this past winter by an induction into the Detroit Mercy Athletics Hall of Fame. Karpala-Humphrey's parents Frank and Halina, husband Rob, daughter Allie, family, coaches, teammates and many others were there to see her enshrinement into the Titan Athletics Hall of Fame as part of the 2020 class.

It would have meant the world to Andrea, who passed away suddenly in early 2017.
 
"She talked about it all of the time," Andrea's mother Halina Karpala said. "I guess when her friend Jack (Szczepaniuk) got into the Hall of Fame, she said, 'this is a possibility. I can do it. And if I do it the whole family is going to the induction in a limousine.' She had it all planned."

"If there was anyone that deserved to be in the Titan Hall of Fame, it was Andrea," her friend and teammate, Jack Szczepaniuk, said. "Just all-around, she was a leader on and off the field. On the track, but also in the classroom. She was dedicated and motivated. Anything she put her mind to, she just went for. She was always positive about it. She always put others before herself."
 
Karpala-Humphrey, from nearby Tecumseh, Ontario, just across the border and a product of St. Anne's Catholic High School, grew up involved in several sports including gymnastics and swimming, volleyball and basketball, and wanted to be a runner on the track and field, but she found her calling as a thrower.

"She always wanted to be a runner, but whenever they had competitions, she always came in third," Halina Karpala said. "But whenever she threw the shot put, she would throw it twice as far as everyone else.
 
"In grade school, that's when she realized she wasn't a runner, but a thrower."
 
And was she ever. Karpala-Humphrey re-wrote the Titan track and field records in several throwing events and helping lead a dynamic throws group on the Titan track and field teams in the early 2000s.
 
Karpala-Humphrey was the Horizon League Field Newcomer of the Year in both indoor and outdoor track and field in 2002 and was the Horizon League Outstanding Field Performer in 2004, at both the indoor and outdoor championships in the HL.
 
She was an eight-time Horizon League champion overall, winning the weight throw three times, hammer throw three times and also winning the shot put twice at the outdoor league championships.
 
"She was a great competitor and her efforts and team efforts were very important to her," Detroit Mercy track and field head coach Guy Murray '89 said. "She took it seriously. We had that great throws group and those guys competed so well. They kind of rose to the occasion, especially at the Horizon League meets.

"The way the meets were set up, they would start off with the hammer or the weight throw and we'd score so many points early on and we'd start the meets at the top of the scoreboard. There were a couple of times where you could see the momentum roll through the team. Andrea was vocal and active, but she was also a leader by doing and really it was more than being a vocal leader. She got us started many times, it just got us going."

Szczepaniuk echoed those sentiments.

"The other thing with throwers in general, I was a sprinter, and I never thought that the throwers got the support that they deserved," he said. "I don't mean support from coaches or teammates, but what I mean is that usually events were held outside of the track or the stadium or in the morning before the bigger crowds arrived at these track meets. They usually didn't get the energy of the crowd behind them, so it was basically shared competition between the athletes in the circle and that's why it was so important for the team to come together.

 
"I always thought that that throws group was such a tight-knit group and she was kind of the anchor of that. I would say that she was the anchor on both sides, men and women. She set a great example for everyone else. She was definitely one of those anchors for the whole team, she led by example and she supported her teammates."
 
The Titans won an indoor HL championship during Karpala-Humphrey's freshman season in 2002 and finished runner-up three times as a team during her tenure. Her name is still etched all over the Titan women's track and field record books as she holds the weight throw record (18.11 meters/59 feet, 5 inches), ranking second in the hammer throw (54.17m/177-9) and eighth in the shot put (13.35m/43-9.75).
 
She was a three-time NCAA Regional Qualifier from 2003-05, reaching all three times in the hammer throw and once in the shot put. She placed better than 18th in all three appearances in the hammer throw, tossing 172 feet, 11 inches in her 2003 appearance. She also represented her native Canada for the hammer throw at the Pan-American games at the Olympic trials.
 
More impressive than her athletic marks were her performances in the classroom and the community. She was a three-time USTFCCCA All-Academic honoree, the only Titan women's track and field student-athlete to receive that honor three times. She was very involved on campus, on the Student-Athlete Advisory Council (SAAC), working in the Learning Center and part of many other organizations and groups at the University.
 
"She was very active," Murray said. "Her major was Electronic Critique at the University and she was a very big people person and she communicated with a lot of people and was very active with the team and the University. When she was part of a group, she knew what was going on with that group and she was active with the group, it didn't matter if it was the team, the University or any outside group. When she was into something, she was active and involved."
 
She was the President's Award winner within the Detroit Mercy Athletic Department as a senior in 2005.
 
"She was very community-minded," Frank Karpala said. "Even back here in Windsor, she did a lot of community events to the point where she applied to the Athena Scholarship and won it the year that she applied. She got involved in a lot of things and just loved life."
 
Karpala-Humphrey was a mentor after she finished her standout career on the field, helping coach the team as a graduate assistant.
 
"She went from being an athlete and then she was on the coaching staff and eventually she was a friend," Murray said. "She was always looking out for the team and the University and I'd get texts about things she knew that I would like or old jokes that we had."
 
She was a motivator in life and like her life's motto, lived life full. She was an avid traveler, loved extreme sports and was beginning to start a family in her post-University of Detroit Mercy life, all while going far in her professional career.
 
"While in grade school, she motivated her best friend Dawn to start running track and cross country to become more athletic," Frank Karpala said. "This continued into high school and eventually Dawn qualified for the Boston marathon. To support her, Andrea traveled with her to Boston to cheer her on and watched her complete the race. Dawn still runs to this day."

 
After college, she worked for PCG Campbell in Detroit and was able to travel all over before returning to Ontario where she eventually worked for the University of Guelph as a Manager of Library Communications.
 
"As a friend, she was always motivational," Szczepaniuk said. "Many people that know her, know that she likes inspirational quotes. There's certain things about her and her personality that you wouldn't know unless you knew her. She loved inspirational quotes. She loved sending hand-written notes, even when social media was becoming popular. As far as the type of person that she was, I actually found (a note) not too long ago from her. It basically was a thank you note and she told me she appreciated our friendship and the support that she had for me."
 
Szczepaniuk, a fellow Titan Hall of Famer, teammate and friend to Karpala-Humphrey, knew he saw greatness when he shared the track and field with her.
 
"I'd say competitively and performance-wise, she stood out above the rest," Szczepaniuk said. "When she was in the circle for the weight or the hammer, you knew that she was going to win. She stood out above the competition. She was a once-in-a-generation type talent that I don't think Detroit Mercy would see too often. We were lucky to have her."
 
Her parents, Halina and Frank, are proud of her accomplishments on and off the track and field and knows she would be proud to be enshrined in the Athletics Hall of Fame.
 
"We were very proud," Halina Karpala said of her Hall of Fame career. "We didn't know how she would do in her sport and then when she started winning, we started keeping a scrapbook of all her accomplishments and Titan write-ups. She was very proud of this scrapbook and the dozens of plaques and awards she earned during her career at Detroit Mercy. She was a true Titan."