(Source: AllState Sugar Bowl June 5, 2019)

Mary Nusloch, winner of nine individual outdoor track state championships for the Academy of the Sacred Heart, has been selected as the Greater New Orleans Amateur Athlete of the Month for May. Monthly award-winners are chosen in voting by the Greater New Orleans Sports Award Selection Committee, sponsored by the Allstate Sugar Bowl.

Nusloch finished off her tremendous career as she amassed four more state titles, including three individual championships as she repeated as state champion in the 800, 1,600 and 3,200 meter runs (for the third straight year) while anchoring the Cardinals’ 4×800 meter relay team which won that competition at the Allstate Sugar Bowl LHSAA Class 3A state track and field championships at Bernie Moore Stadium in Baton Rouge on May 4. Nusloch’s efforts (30 individual points) almost single-handedly led Sacred Heart to a repeat as state champion in Class 3A, finishing 15 points better than second-place Brusly (75-54 in total points as Sacred Heart scored just one field point). The reigning Gatorade Louisiana Girls Cross Country Runner of the Year finished her illustrious career with 14 individual state titles – nine in outdoor track as well as three in indoor track and two in cross country.

Nusloch earned the honor over an outstanding field of contenders, including two baseball stars, a pair of collegiate track champions and a youth track and field record-holder. LSU baseball standouts Cade Beloso and Daniel Cabrera, both Greater New Orleans products, keyed LSU’s run to the NCAA Tournament – Beloso hit .272 with three home runs in May while Cabrera hit .227 with five homers. Tulane’s Emmanuel Rotich won the 3,000-meter steeplechase and the 5,000-meter run to tally 20 of Tulane’s 33 points at the American Athletic Conference Outdoor Track & Field Championship while Xavier University’s Shalysa Wray earned All-America honors in four different events at the NAIA National Outdoor Track Championships – just a freshman, she was the only woman to score in four events at the meet. In the youth ranks, 12-year old Robert Vaughn from the New Orleans Metro Stars track club set a meet record in the javelin while winning the discus and placing third in the shot put at the prestigious Mark Trail Invitational in Lawrenceville, Ga.

The Greater New Orleans Sports Selection Committee has been selecting an Amateur Athlete of the Month each month since 1957. The athlete must be a native of the greater New Orleans area or must compete for a team in the metropolitan region in order to be eligible. Each of the monthly award winners will be honored in the summer at the Greater New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame Induction and Awards Ceremony, hosted by the Allstate Sugar Bowl.