Navajo Times honors best of spring sports

WINDOW ROCK

Playing baseball is not uncommon for a girl growing up in Navajo country.

And when it comes to people like Chinle High School graduate Shailyn Ayze, it helped her rake in the award she accepted on Tuesday at the Navajo Times 2016 Spring Sports All-Stars awards banquet for softball athlete of the year.

“I deserve this,” she said. “I started off playing baseball when I was 10 years old and continued playing softball…I played my catching position for seven years. I’m very excited because it means a lot to me, my family, my community.”

Ayze was one of a dozen student athletes to be named athlete of the year in their respective sports at a luncheon held by the Navajo Times.

Ayze, along with the rest of the Lady Wildcats, qualified for the state tournament in all four seasons she played on the high school team. She was the lone senior on the team this year and she plans to take online college classes now that she’s graduated.

“I’d just like to thank my parents and my coaches for supporting me and telling me that I can do it,” Ayze said.

Aztec High School’s Paige Adair and Miyamura’s Monique Ashley were also named softball athletes of the year.

This was one of the few years where one school had two athletes received the prestigious award as Chinle’s Jakub Joe was named the baseball player of the year. He shared that honor with Miyamura’s Anthony Montoya.

Joe said the award was testament of the work ethic he had in his final high school season.

“I was pretty excited when I first heard it. I was pretty honored. All my practice and hard work paid off,” he said. “I put in enough work to get this award, but I put in more to get better.”

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