Posted by Deputy Editor Mark Tennis
Contributing: Paul Muyskens, Harold Abend

It's a group of great geographic balance as top honors go to girls athletes from Valencia, Palo Alto, Shafter, Sacramento, Manhattan Beach and Fullerton. More all-state athletes of the year added for each category as well.

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Note: It is not a requirement that an athlete of the year needed to have participated in more than one sport. Single-sport athletes often do end up first in our selection process due to the significance of their accomplishments within their sport. These honors also are mostly based on athletic performance during the school year. Academics and community service are considered, but are not as important as athletics.

State Division I Athlete of the Year
Jessica Spigner (Valencia) Sr.
As Jessica's mother, Dyan, was thanking us for her EA SPORTS national softball honor, we had to tell her there was one more to go. Spigner had one of the most dominating pitching-hitting-fielding seasons of recent memory. She led the Vikings to their second straight CIF Southern Section Division I championship, defeating nationally ranked Santiago of Corona 3-2 in the semis as she not only picked up the semifinal win but hit two home runs in the victory. On the year, she struck out 222 batters in 236 innings and won 29 games with a 0.62 ERA. The standout infielder also showed why Tennessee wanted her bat as she hit .480 with 38 RBI and 12 home runs.

More Division I All-State Athletes of the Year
(Seniors only, see below for others)
Emily Allard (Deer Valley, Antioch) basketball, softball
Karlee Bispo (Downey, Modesto) swimming
Elena Fata (San Benito, Hollister) tennis, basketball, softball
Sarah McAtee (Nevada Union, Grass Valley) volleyball, basketball
Kauren Tarver (Serrano, Phelan) cross country, soccer, track

State Division II Athlete of the Year
Teresa Noyola (Palo Alto) Sr.
This one came down to three CIF Central Coast Section athletes with Noyola joined by the Mt. Pleasant of San Jose track duo of Vashti Thomas and Jeneba Tarboh. Thomas won three events at the CIF state meet, but Tarboh was hurt and then came back and when healthy won gold at the World Junior Championships. Noyola is as much, if not more, of a standout internationally as Tarboh. She scored winning goals earlier this year against England and Norway for the U.S. U-20 national team as it won the Four Nations Tourney in Chile. Noyola also stood out for the U.S. U-20 team when it was second at the Cyprus World Cup. She was just as passionate about her high school team at Palo Alto, and despite her schedule with U.S. Soccer she played in 15 of Paly's 22 games. Noyola scored 18 goals and had seven assists in those games and the team went 10-0-1 in games in which she at least posted an assist. Noyola also was the Parade and Gatorade National Player of the Year.

More All-State Division II Athletes of the Year
(Seniors only, see below for others)
Christine Babcock (Woodbridge, irvine) cross country, track
Amanda Gil (Archbishop Mitty, San Jose) volleyball
Hannah Stephens (Archbishop Mitty, San Jose) water polo, basketball
Jeneba Tarmoh (Mt. Pleasant, San Jose) track
Vashti Thomas (Mt. Pleasant, San Jose) track

State Division III Athlete of the Year
Anna Jelmini (Shafter) Sr.
This standout athlete is becoming a world traveler as well as she wrapped up her junior year by going to Bydgoszcz, Poland to compete in the IAAF World Junior Championships after capturing the U.S. Junior National title in the discus. With a throw of 49.46 meters, she qualified for the final eight before finishing in seventh place. Earlier in the year, Jelmini set multiple meet records in the discus and shot put while extending her state-best mark in the shot put on her way to winning two CIF state championships. Jelmini also played basketball for the Generals as well and was easily their best player as she averaged over three times as many points per game as the next player with 19 points per game to go along with three rebounds and one steal per game.

More All-State State Division III Athletes of the Year
(Seniors only, see below for others)
Katie Batlin (Miramonte, Orinda) volleyball, basketball
Jazmine Jackson (Sacred Heart Cathedral, S.F.) basketball
Megan Norton (Harvard-Westlake, N. Hollywood) volleyball
Jenna Rich (El Segundo) soccer, softball

State Division IV Athlete of the Year
Brittany Woodard (Christian Brothers, Sacramento) Sr.
Woodard is arguably one of the best all-around girls' athletes to come out of the Sacramento area in many years and as such was honored this year by the Sacramento Bee as its female athlete of the year. As a volleyball player, the 6-foot outside hitter led her team into the CIF state playoffs three consecutive years, reaching the Division IV title match last year before falling to Loyola-Marymount of Los Angeles in the finals. In basketball, playing power forward and post, Woodard led Christian Brothers into the Division IV NorCals this past season where the team defeated Modesto Christian (Modesto) before falling to eventual state champion St. Patrick-St. Vincent of Vallejo. Her per game numbers for the campaign were 18.1 points, 8.1 rebounds, 2.6 steals, 2.0 assists and 1.4 blocks. Although offered a scholarship to Nevada to play both volleyball and basketball, she has decided to concentrate on her favorite sport of basketball at the next level.   

More All-State Division IV Athletes of the Year
Alex Cowling (St. Patrick-St. Vincent, Vallejo) basketball
Nikki Speed (Marlborough, Los Angeles) basketball

State Division V Athlete of the Year
Jordan Hasay (Mission Prep, San Luis Obispo) Jr.
This is the third straight year that Jordan has been the top girls athlete for schools in Mission Prep's enrollment division. She will no doubt make it four-for-four next year at this time.

More All-State Division V Athletes of the Year
Rachael Bilney (Branson, Ross) Basketball
Katharine Brown (St. Francis CCC, Watsonville) volleyball, basketball (Jr.)
Turea Jones (Rincon Valley Christian, Santa Rosa) volleyball, basketball, softball
Note: Camille Levin, one of the top under-20 soccer players in the U.S., attends Tarbut V'Torah of Irvine (Division V) but did not play for her high school team. She will be put into the state record book for alumni lists and could have been overall state athlete of the year, but wasn't eligible for her school-based enrollment division.

State Senior Athlete of the Year:
Teresa Noyola (Palo Alto) Sr.
She's already written up mostly above for CIF Division II. Noyola, who will attend nearby Stanford University in the fall, was the choice among juniors a year ago.

State Junior Athlete of the Year
Jordan Hasay (Mission Prep, San Luis Obispo)
This is another no-brainer with Hasay being the overall state athlete of the year. If she keeps doing what she's doing, the decision about going pro or going to college may be in her future.

More Junior All-State Athletes of the Year
Layshia Clarendon (Cajon, San Bernardino) basketball
Kayla Griffin (Moreau Catholic, Hayward) basketball, softball
Mattie Larsen (Baldwin Park Charter) gymnastics*
Jane Rah (Torrance) golf
Keilani Ricketts (Archbishop Mitty, San Jose) basketball, softball
Chloe Sutton (Mission Viejo) open water swimming**
*Larsen's school does not have sports; she hopes to be on U.S. Olympic team in Beijing.
**Sutton lives in Mission Viejo, but takes correspondence courses at home and does not attend regular high school. She already has qualified for U.S. Olympic team in Beijing.

State Sophomore Athlete of the Year
Falyn Fonomoana (Mira Costa, Manhattan Beach)
She has become one of the top high school volleyball players in the nation as she continued to dominate leading the Mustangs to another Southern Section Division I-AA championship. In the championship game sweep over Redondo she had 17 kills and had the crowd chanting "You cant stop her." Fonomoana then went on lead Costa in a defeat of Archbishop Mitty to finish 37-0 and capture the Division II state championship. Before kicking off her sophomore year, she already verbally committed to USC and last summer traveled overseas to take part in a beach volleyball event. At 6-4 and still growing she has been a member or the U.S. U-14 and U-18 national team. Her mom played beach volleyball and trained with her sister who swam in the 1976 Olympics. She's also the niece of Eric Fonomoana, one of the most well-known pro beach volleyball players in the world.

More Sophomore All-State Athletes of the Year
Cynthia Fascella (Fountain Valley) swimming
Chelsea Gray (St. Mary's, Stockton) basketball
Ashley Smith (Millikan, Long Beach) basketball, track
Jacque Taylor (Casa Grande, Petaluma) cross country, track

State Freshman Athlete of the Year
Kristen Park (Sunny Hills, Fullerton)
The number two ranked girls' junior golfer in the nation actually helped the Lancers' boys golf team become state champions. Ranked by the American Junior Golf Association at number two in the nation she already has taken an unofficial recruiting trip to USC, has Sports Illustrated calling for interviews, and has Nike offering her customized clubs. Park was the youngest member of the U.S. team at the Junior Solheim Cup in Sweden and despite the team's loss she was the only member of her team not to lose a match. As a part of her busy summer, she won the U.S. Junior Girls Amateur Championship and was the fourth youngest to ever have won that title.

More Freshmen All-State Athletes of the Year
Justine Hartman (Brea Olinda, Brea) basketball
Melanie Klaren (Mater Dei, Santa Ana) swimming
Akakaw Ndipagbor (Poly, Long Beach) track
Jenna Prandini (Clovis) volleyball, track
Haley Rosen (Palos Verdes, PV Estates) soccer

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