By Tim Clinton
SPORTS EDITOR

It was the Highline Public Schools 6th Annual Scholar-Athlete, Coach and Community Recognition Banquet, and the last with Terri McMahan leading the way in her capacity as district athletic director.

McMahan used her impending retirement as a reason to honor those above her in the district, such as superintendent Dr. Susan Enfield.

"Some say it's self serving to honor people above you, but because I'm not coming back, I'm going to," McMahan told Tuesday's gathering at Mount Rainier High School.

Master of ceremonies Dick Fain, a Mount Rainier graduate who is now a KJR-Radio sports personality and has been the voice of the Seattle Storm for six years, chose to honor McMahan.

"Thank you for all of your time," he told her from behind the microphone.

The banquet was mostly about honoring top scholar-athletes from the Highline School District's four high schools, along with coaches of the year from each school including the four middle schools.

A total of 16 athletes -- four seniors from each high school -- received college scholarships with a minimum award of $1,500 and a maximum award of $5,000.

McMahan, who was named as the state athletic director of the year, pointed out that $185,000 has been raised for scholarships since the program began in 2012.

The top $5,000 awards went to Evergreen High School's Elizabeth Lindo and Highline High School's Carson Torres.

Lindo played basketball and volleyball and plans on attending the University of Washington to major in Biology, while Torres competed in cross country, girls wrestling and track and field and plans on majoring in Oceanography at the same school.

Awards of $4,000 went to Cooper King of Mount Rainier and Benji Box of Highline.
King played basketball and baseball and will go to Grinnell College to major in Business or Economics, while Box competed in foortball, wrestling and track and field and will go to Montana State University to major in Engineering.

Awards of $3,000 went to Tyee's Austin Wiebe and Mount Rainier's Ainsley Keane.
Wiebe played basketball and soccer but is still undecided about where he will major in Business Administration. Keane played soccer and basketball and competed in track and field. She plans on majoring in Business at Washington State University.

The two $2,000 awards went to Diana Kim-Ngan Nguyen of Evergreen and Brittany Schaff of Highline.
Nguyen wrestled and played tennis for the Wolverines and plans on going to Gonzaga University to study Computer Science, while Schaff was in swimming, gymnastics and drill and plans on going to Grand Canyon University to major in Medicine.

Awards of $1,500 each went to Andrue Elam, Maiah Graham and Hajara Omar of Tyee; Ruby Lynde-Ginal and Nathan Sheffield of Mount Rainier; Tommie McNeal of Highline and Evergreen's JuanJose Ruvalcaba and Alec Vo.
Elam competed in cross country and baseball and plans on going to Central Washington University for a Business major, while Graham was involved in volleyball, basketball and track and field and will go to South Seattle College to study Psychology. Omar was in soccer and basketball and will go to Highline College to major in the medical field.

Lynde-Ginal was in cheer and dance at Mount Rainier and plans to major in English at Gonzaga University. Sheffield was in football, swimming and diving and baseball and plans on majoring in Business at the University of Washington.

McNeal played golf and soccer at Highline and plans on going to Evergreen State College for Philosophy.
Ruvalcaba was in cross country and swimming at Evergreen and is going to the University of Washington for Computer Engineering and Vo was in football and wrestling and plans on majoring in Computer Science at the University of Washington Tacoma campus.

Coaches of the year from their respective schools were Tremain Mack of Mount Rainier, Colleen Modde of Highline, Seyti Sidibay of Tyee, Emily Zimmerman of Evergreen, Heather Boswell of Sylvester Middle School, Nate Lommen of Cascade Middle School, Joey Martinez of Pacific Middle School and Reid Sundblad of Chinook Middle School.

Mack is a former Cincinnati Bengal who coached football and assisted in basketball and baseball, while Modde coached volleyball and Zimmerman coached the cheer squad. Sidibay coached boys and girls soccer and led Tyee to a 13-0-1 league record in boys soccer this spring.

Boswell coached girls soccer and assisted in boys, while Lommen coached boys basketball and Martinez football. Sunblad led the track and field and cross country teams.

The banquet also honors state champions from the Highline School District starting last year, and this year's state champion was Naleia Gomez of Mount Rainier in the beam for gymnastics. Gomez is a junior.