North Broward Prep's Alexa Schwartz is the Broward Girls' Scholar-Athlete of the Year
As senior Alexa Schwartz wraps up her high school career at North Broward Prep, she leaves as a record-setter, a leader and one of the school's all-time greats in two sports.
Schwartz set a state meet record in track and field and became a state champion.
She also helped resurrect a girls' basketball program, making them a playoff regular again while securing a place at the top of the school record book in multiple categories.
Schwartz did all of this while excelling as a student as well, earning herself a scholarship to attend Florida State University.
For her long list of accomplishments, Schwartz is the Miami Herald's Girls' Scholar-Athlete of the Year for Broward County.
Schwartz is heading to FSU after graduating with a 4.7 GPA and scoring a 30 on her ACT.
On the basketball court, Schwartz heads to the college level as North Broward Prep's all-time leading scorer with over 1,000 points and single season assists leader. Schwartz, who recorded the school's first triple-double in a game, was a Florida Athletic Coaches Association All-State selection and led the Eagles to the regional finals in 2023. That appearance broke a 12-year drought of not advancing to the regional playoffs. North Broward Prep made it back to regionals again this season, losing in the quarterfinals.
Schwartz also excelled as the state's best javelin thrower.
In an event, which was added as a regular event in state competition in recent years, Schwartz set a new state meet record earlier this month when she won the Class 2A state title with a throw of 47.04 meters. Schwartz was a two-time state champion and three-time district champion in the event.
Schwartz was a Miami Herald Silver Knight nominee, was part of the school's Honor Roll every semester, and is a member of seven different National Honor Societies.
Schwartz also became a leader at her school and in the community, volunteering over 700 hours as she was involved in several Jewish youth organizations as a teacher and mentor.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
NBC Sports
8 hours ago
- NBC Sports
Steve Wright, NFL lineman who modeled Man of the Year trophy, dies at 82
Steve Wright, an NFL lineman whose impressive stature was immortalized in a sculpture that became the NFL's Walter Payton Man of the Year trophy, has died at the age of 82. The 6-foot-6, 250-pound Wright was a giant for his day and an imposing offensive tackle at Alabama, where he won a national championship in 1961. He was drafted by both the Packers in the NFL and the Jets in the AFL in 1964. Wright chose to play in Green Bay, and he won three championships and played in Super Bowls I and II. He later bounced around the league in four different cities, playing in New York, Washington, Chicago and St. Louis before finishing his professional career in the World Football League in 1974. In an era when football players were expected to follow their coaches' orders, Wright — despite playing for the hard-nosed Bear Bryant in college and Vince Lombardi in the NFL — gained a reputation for questioning everything. At the end of his career he published a memoir, I'd Rather be Wright: Memoirs of an Itinerant Tackle, that gave fans an inside look at life in pro football from an irreverent perspective that had rarely been shared before. But Wright is best known for serving as a model for sculptor Daniel Bennett Schwartz after the NFL commissioned Schwartz to make a distinctive trophy for a new award the league wanted to bestow on a player who epitomized everything that's right about the men who play pro football, both on and off the field. Wright stood in his uniform with a giant cape-like overcoat on his shoulder pads as Schwartz went to work creating a statue he called 'The Gladiator' that the NFL adopted as its Man of the Year Trophy. In 1970, Johnny Unitas became the first player to receive that NFL Man of the Year trophy. Walter Payton got the award in 1977, and after he died in 1999 the league changed the award's name to Walter Payton Man of the Year. The self-deprecating Wright often joked about how amusing he found it that such great players and great men were presented with 'a statue of me.' Wright was the first to admit he wasn't a great NFL player, agreeing in his book with Lombardi's assessment that he had the physical talent to be a bulldozing lineman but was too nice a guy to want to run over the player across the line from him. But Wright will always have a connection to some of the NFL's all-time greats, thanks to the award that bears his likeness.
Yahoo
8 hours ago
- Yahoo
From homeless to pro football: What happens to the guys who never quite make it?
In an effort to land a look by an NFL team, he slept on a mattress outside of a community center, had no money, and lied his way into the tryout. You always hear about the athlete, or entertainer, who sleeps in their car, or eats the leftovers behind the restaurant in the alley, before catching the break to realize their dream. You never hear about the people who do the same things but never reach that status. Advertisement There are far more examples of those. Damon Sheehy-Guiseppi is not a wide receiver you'd know. You may have heard his story as the guy who was 'homeless' before he caught on for hot minute with the Cleveland Browns, when he was 21. That was in 2019. Today, Sheehy-Guiseppi is 30, and just completed the season with the UFL's Arlington Renegades, who missed the playoffs. Considering where Sheehy-Guiseppi began, he should never have played a game beyond unior college. He can always say he made it as a pro football player. He was paid, and sometimes housed, to play football. It just wasn't in the NFL. Advertisement Whether this qualifies as 'success,' or a dream fulfilled, depends not on the fan, coach, or scout but Sheehy-Guiseppi. A high point in the football career of Damon Sheehy-Guiseppi (right) when he was with the Cleveland Browns during training camp in 2019. He just finished the season with the Arlington Renegades of the UFL. Never quitting football Sheehy-Guiseppi ran track in junior college before he transferred to another community college and tried out for the football team. In 2016, he was first team National Junior College Athletic Association All-American after he led the nation in kick return yards for Phoenix College. This is the part how he became 'homeless.' After his college career ended following the '16 season, he was done with football before he decided to give it one more try. He had been given an address of an NFL free agent workout near Miami. Advertisement 'I saved enough money for a one-way ticket to Miami,' he told the Star-Telegram in an interview of his trip from Phoenix to South Beach in the spring of 2016. 'I didn't have a car. I had a cell phone. That was it.' When he landed, he had no money. Someone spotted him at the bus stop outside the airport and gave him $5 for a one way ride that would drop him off about one mile from the facility. When he arrived for the tryout, his name was not on an invite list with the approximately 15 other players. He knew one name to name drop his way into a workout. That part worked. But he had no place to stay. Advertisement 'I found a Jewish Community Center that was gated, so my first night in town I found this little grass spot in the back and I thought, 'I'm going to stay here,'' he said. 'Then I found a mattress that was going in the trash. I dragged that over behind the bushes and trees. No one could see it. 'I made sure I woke up early enough to get my workout in. Then I would go to the beach. Go to a laundromat. Relax. I would just walk around with my duffle bag until it was time to lay down again.' He ran into a familiar face at the tryout, who knew an agent, who took him to lunch. It was the first meal he ate since the Chex Mix on the plane. He ate, and took their to go boxes. Not entirely sure of the agent's intentions, he passed on the ride and instead had to call a friend in Phoenix to arrange a cab to the Jewish Community Center. This was one week of his life, but it paid off when the Browns invited him for a tryout in Cleveland. Advertisement No one ever caught him sleeping on that mattress behind the Jewish Community Center. 'Making it' in the pros During his tryout with the Browns, he ran a 4.38 40-yard dash. That earned him an invite to training camp. He had turned a decimal point of an opportunity that he created by himself into a real look. In the team's first preseason game of the 2019 season, he returned a punt 86 yards for a score. Less than a month later, he was cut. 'After that, it all gets a little blurry. I don't remember the teams but I remember the leagues,' he said. 'It was the XFL in 2020. Then it was off to The Spring League. ... I think, in all, it was 10 leagues.' Advertisement Using Phoenix as his home base, where his mother lives, he never did stop chasing football. He signed to play with the XFL when it launched in 2020, but that ended a few months after it started because of COVID. 'The Spring League' was an actual developmental league, that folded in 2021. He signed with the CFL but never played in a game because of injury. He signed, in 2022, with Major League Football, which closed during training camp. Late in 2023, he signed with a team in Italy, and led his team the following year in receptions, yards and touchdown catches. He was named that league's offensive player of the year in 2024. 'Now that was super fun,' he said. 'It's the same game, but the speed of it was different.' Advertisement After that season, he signed with the UFL for 2025, but battled injuries nearly that kept him on the sideline for most of the season.. He said playing for the Arlington Renegades is the most money he's made as a pro. If someone had told him when he started this that he could be a pro football player, but that this is what being a 'pro player' is, would he do it? 'Tough question. I would do it because it's not over. So I feel like my end goal is still gonna happen,' said Sheehy-Guiseppi, who hopes to eventually work with young players to help them navigate a system that can crush them if they are not careful. His end goal is one more try out. One more look by an NFL team. Advertisement Whether it comes or not, Damon Sheehy-Guiseppi has had a career as a pro football player. He was paid to play football. Not a lot, and it wasn't in the NFL. Whether this qualifies as 'success,' or a dream fulfilled, depends not on the fan, coach, or scout but Sheehy-Guiseppi.
USA Today
9 hours ago
- USA Today
Legendary USC safety Taylor Mays on 2026 College Football Hall of Fame ballot
Legendary USC safety Taylor Mays on 2026 College Football Hall of Fame ballot On Monday, the College Football Hall of Fame announced its ballot for the class of 2026. Included on this year's ballot is legendary USC safety Taylor Mays. A blue-chip recruit from the state of Washington, Mays played for Pete Carroll's Trojans from 2006 through 2009. He had one of the most decorated careers of any player in college football history, being named a first-team All-American an astonishing three times (and was a second-team All-American as a freshman in 2006). Known for his hard-hitting abilities, Mays was one of the driving forces behind the Trojans' elite defenses of the latter half of the Carroll era. During his time at USC, Mays won three Pac-10 titles and three Rose Bowls. Mays was picked in the second round of the 2010 NFL draft, and would go on to play six seasons in the league. Since the conclusion of his playing career, Mays has gotten into coaching, spending the past three seasons on Lincoln Riley's staff at USC as a defensive analyst. In January, he was named the safeties coach at Washington. One of the greatest Jewish football players of all-time, Mays was inducted into the Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 2011. 14 years later, he is looking to add another hall of fame to his resume.
