Palestine places five on Academic All-State team

May 26—Five members of the Palestine Wildcats track team were honored as Academic All-State by the Texas High School Coaches Association.

Bryce Jackson, Jarrett Henry, Mason Mitchell, Pedro Garcia Castillo and Tyler Hunt were all recognized with the prestigious honor. Castillo was named to the first team, while the remaining four were honorable mentions.

To be nominated for Academic All-State, a student must participate in athletics in some capacity, be of good moral character, a senior and have an overall grade point average of 92 or above.

Nominations must be made by the head coach of the prospective sport and the head coach must be a member by October 15th. After the nominations are submitted and the deadline is passed, the nominations are sent to the THSCA for review.

While the student might initially meet the criteria for nomination, that does not guarantee the student a spot on a team. When reviewing the nominations, the THSCA considers each students' GPA, class rank, SAT and/or ACT score. The students receive points based on each criteria. The total number of points they receive determines which team they are placed on. The classification of the school is not a factor, and there's not a limit on how many players can make a team.

The best team a player can make is the Elite Team. It is a great honor to make the Elite team, as a player must have near perfect scores in all categories. The hierarchy then follows in this order: 1st team, 2nd team and honorable mention.

Several other athletes from around the county were also named Academic All-State in their respective sport. Neches' Zane Munsinger received a second team nod.

Slocum's Jose Molina and Ryan Laroche were both honorable mentions. Westwood's Jaysa Coney received honorable mention.

Neches' Abigail Spaith and Mallory Main were both honorable mentions. The biggest collection of awards went to Elkhart who had 11 athletes selected.

Mallory Mays was a first-team recipient. Payton Thomas, Landry Langley, Preslee Lipsey, Claire Herring, Lynsie Walding and Cami Pyeatt made the second team. Luke Johnson, Zach Johnson, Haleigh Hughes and Wyett Thomas were honorable mentions.

Frankston's Kaitlyn Matthews and Kesley Sexton were honorable mentions, while Lady Tigers Kendall Tidwell and Gracie Carson also shared honorable mention.