Merced-area athletes honored at Sac-Joaquin Section scholarship breakfast

Six area high school athletes were honored at the Sac-Joaquin Section’s A. Dale Lacky/CSEA Scholarship & Model Coach Award Breakfast on Tuesday.

Golden Valley’s Stephanie Moore and Hilmar’s Jarrod Willis received two of the top scholarships from the section. Moore was one of eight students to receive a $1,000 scholarship, and Willis was one of the two recipients of the $1,500 Clarke Coover Scholarship in honor of the former Sac-Joaquin Section commissioner.

Also receiving $500 scholarships were Los Banos’ Alexandra Marquez Yanez, Buhach Colony’s Hunter Helfgott, Stone Ridge Christian’s Alexis Louters and Mariposa’s Anna Medema.

“I don’t know how to put into words what this means,” Helfgott said. “Everything I’ve been working for and all the hard work is paying off as my senior year is coming to an end.”

Longtime Golden Valley volleyball and girls basketball coach Matt Thissen also received his Model Coach award.

“It’s a very humbling honor,” Thissen said. “I guess it’s nice to be recognized for a lot of years of dedication. Of course, none of this would have been possible without the support of the administration at school and my family.”

The section handed out 48 scholarships totaling $30,000. Most of those funds are raised from the foundation basketball games and volleyball matches, in which half of the admission cost goes to the section for the scholarship program.

The section has awarded 669 scholarships totaling more than $450,000 since the inception of the program.

The scholarships aren’t just based on athletic performance. Academics and community service are also considered.

The résumés of the local scholarship winners are impressive.

Willis played football, basketball and baseball at Hilmar and completed more than 300 hours of community service to go with a 4.06 GPA.

“Hilmar as a community is always involved,” said Willis, who plans to attend Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. “So anytime I can help out, I get involved. Anytime I hear about something at school, I get involved. My mom being a kindergarten teacher, I’m always helping out with the little kids, too.”

Helfgott, who is also headed to Cal Poly, participated in swimming and water polo at Buhach Colony, volunteers as a teacher’s aide at a local elementary school and has a 4.16 GPA.

Marquez Yanez volunteers with St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, Valley Children’s Hospital, Toys for Tots, Salvation Army and has a 4.22 GPA. She still found time to swim and play water polo for four years.

Medema has received honors for just about every subject in school and is the president of the French Club. She’s also No. 1 in her class with a 4.39 GPA.

While playing volleyball, basketball and softball all four years, Louters also accumulated more than 350 hours of community service, served on mission trips to Guatemala and has a 3.94 GPA.

Moore, the Sun-Star Girls Basketball Player of the Year in her junior and senior seasons, volunteers as a middle school tutor, youth basketball coach, with a breast cancer awareness fundraiser, Operation Christmas Child, and she makes blankets for chemotherapy patients.

Moore, who is No. 1 in her class at Golden Valley with a 4.28 GPA, was one of two students chosen to read the essay they submitted on sportsmanship.

“I am keenly aware that there is always someone else working more, reading more, studying more and practicing more,” Moore read. “One would be foolish to think that there is not another person vying for my position or my opportunities.

“With opponents challenging potential realities, there are a plethora of choices to be made, and my response to those challenges will forge my character more than any success.”

As each award was handed out, a short bio of each student was read to the crowd.

“After hearing what everyone did in high school I was in awe of the talent in this room,” Moore said. “There are some astrophysicists and people with 4.9 GPAs. I really hope I get to meet some of these people later in life.”

“Everyone here is at the top of their school,” Willis said. “It’s cool to hear everyone’s story and how they got here. It’s an honor to be with all these people.”

This story was originally published April 19, 2016 at 4:59 PM with the headline "Merced-area athletes honored at Sac-Joaquin Section scholarship breakfast."