November 19, 2005

Senior Lisa Helmers ended her recruitment this week and nobody was as happy as she was.

“I’m so glad I made the decision early,” Helmers said.  “It takes a lot of worry out of my high school basketball season.  Now I can really enjoy my senior year.”

A leader on the Aztec girls basketball team almost her entire four years, Helmers was very confident in her decision to attend Loyola Marymount University.

“The location was great and so were the coaches,” Helmers said.  “Loyola was also a great school academically.”

Despite the intense interest from University of Portland as well as Santa Clara University, Helmers knew that LMU was the right choice for her.  Her teammate on the Arizona Elite club team, Jessica Vargas will also be attending Loyola Marymount next year.

Although Helmers will be playing basketball in college she also was a pivotal member of the Corona girls varsity volleyball team.

“I never really though about not playing,” Helmers said.  “It keeps you in shape.”

The Aztec volleyball squad took second in state against top rival Xavier High School. 

The game was amazing,” Helmers said.  “Playing in a big arena with all the fans watching brought it to a bigger level.”

With volleyball season over, Helmers must now focus on leading an inexperienced squad in basketball.

“Although we’re young hopefully we can make a lot of improvements as the season goes on,” Helmers said.  “Jordyn Wentis is a sophomore who can come out right away and make a big impact.”

The Aztec Boy’s Varsity golf team concluded their season with a 5^th place overall finish in state.  Hamilton High School took first in one of the strongest field of teams in years.  Although the Aztecs had hoped for a higher finish, the future for the team looks very promising.

“We return five of our top six players next season, which is really exciting,” Junior Nate Scherotter said.  “Brophy graduates all of their top six and Hamilton loses three of their top six so we seem to be in good shape for next year.”

With a team that believed it was among the top three in state, their finish was rather disappointing.

“We just didn’t capitalize on the opportunities we had,” Scherotter said.  “We didn’t play great, we all just played ok.”

Between high school golf seasons, players generally can play at tournaments sponsored by different associations.  The JGAA (Junior Golf Association of Arizona) has individual tourneys that most members of the Aztec team will be participating in.  Hopefully the tough lessons learned by this year’s squad can translate into bigger success next year. 

“This year we played more like a team than in years past,” Scherotter said.  “This experience will hopefully let us become stronger players for next year.”

The Aztec Varsity swim team continued their region dominance with both the boys and girls teams taking 1^st in region.  The girls swim team had an especially impressive year with head coach Deb Peterson being awarded the Girls Region Coach of the year, and swimmers Erin Campbell and Sam Maxwell being named region swimmers of the year.

Girls swim placed third overall in the state tournament and also were named the Tempe city champs.  The boys team was led by region swimmer of the year Nate Telep and they took 5^th overall.