{"id":229749,"date":"2026-05-13T10:35:41","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T10:35:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/229749\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T10:35:41","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T10:35:41","slug":"college-swimmer-killed-in-car-crash-hours-after-his-graduation-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/229749\/","title":{"rendered":"College swimmer killed in car crash hours after his graduation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">CHARLOTTE, N.C. (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wbtv.com\/2026\/05\/12\/college-athlete-killed-charlotte-crash-hours-after-graduation\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.wbtv.com\/2026\/05\/12\/college-athlete-killed-charlotte-crash-hours-after-graduation\/\">WBTV<\/a>\/Gray News) &#8211; A college athlete from North Carolina died in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wbtv.com\/2026\/05\/12\/bmw-crashes-into-tree-deadly-overnight-south-charlotte-wreck-police-say\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.wbtv.com\/2026\/05\/12\/bmw-crashes-into-tree-deadly-overnight-south-charlotte-wreck-police-say\/\">Mother\u2019s Day car crash<\/a> just hours after he graduated.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Keegan McKenney, 22, was a passenger in a BMW that ran off the side of the road and hit a tree around 2:15 a.m. Sunday in Charlotte, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.charlottenc.gov\/cmpd\/News-Information\/Newsroom\/Fatal-Crash-Investigation-in-the-Providence-Division-05.10.26\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.charlottenc.gov\/cmpd\/News-Information\/Newsroom\/Fatal-Crash-Investigation-in-the-Providence-Division-05.10.26\">Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police<\/a>. Police say firefighters had to cut three people out of the car. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">McKenney died at the scene.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Queens University of Charlotte confirmed on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/DYNcs4MJ8-n\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/DYNcs4MJ8-n\/\">social media<\/a> that McKenney was a member of the school\u2019s swim team. University officials say he had just graduated Saturday, less than 24 hours before the deadly crash.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe honor the life of Keegan McKenney &#8212; a cherished teammate, friend, and member of the Queens family whose impact will never be forgotten,\u201d the school posted. \u201cOur thoughts are with all who knew and loved him during this incredibly difficult time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Queens\u2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/queensathletics.com\/sports\/mens-swimming-and-diving\/roster\/keegan-mckenney\/12703\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/queensathletics.com\/sports\/mens-swimming-and-diving\/roster\/keegan-mckenney\/12703\">roster<\/a> showed that McKenney was from Maine. The roster indicated he competed in the individual medley and butterfly events.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Police said everyone in the car was wearing a seatbelt when the crash happened. They said Tuesday that more investigation was needed to determine if speed or impairment was a factor.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 WBTV via Gray Local Media, Inc. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHARLOTTE, N.C. (WBTV\/Gray News) &#8211; A college athlete from North Carolina died in a Mother\u2019s Day car crash&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":229750,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[90205,90206,90207,31642,9,24,1064,63,122,124,123,4455],"class_list":["post-229749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-college-athlete-killed-in-crash","tag-college-swimmer-killed-in-car-crash","tag-killed-in-crash-hours-after-graduation","tag-mothers-day","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-north-carolina","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-queens-university-of-charlotte"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229749\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}