8 minute read
Highlighting Energy, Pride & Community in Junior Competitive Programs
Every May and June, I step into the whirlwind of season-ending banquets for our nine junior competitive programs. It’s an array of southwestern taco buffets, absolute tearjerker senior speeches, and PowerPoints jampacked with the most memorable moments from the season.
It’s hard to capture in just a few words how meaningful these nights are. We’re celebrating nearly 700 young athletes who proudly represent MAC each year. These evenings are a true highlight showcasing the drive, discipline, and love for sport that our athletes bring to their teams, along with the deep commitment their families and coaches make to support that journey.
This month, our coaches are sharing some of their season highlights here, but I can promise you nothing quite compares to the energy, pride, and sense of community we feel together in the Ballroom at these banquets. It’s been another banner year for MAC Athletics, and we’re so proud to celebrate it with all of you.
Climbing
Our competitive season continues into July and will end with the conclusion of USAC Climbing Youth National Championships. At Youth National Championships there will be six MAC athletes competing in the Boulder discipline, nine competing in the Lead/Top Rope discipline, and over 20 competing in the Speed discipline.
The Climbing Team placed 2nd in our region and 4th in our division for Bouldering. We also placed 2nd in our region and 2nd in our division for Lead/Top rope. Austin Oviatt, Tejal Deenadayalu, and Ro DuBois were all regional champions for Bouldering. Alyssa Keanini, Tejal Deenadayalu, and Uma Deenadayalu were all regional champions for Lead/Top Rope. Alyssa Keanini was also Divisional Champion for Bouldering, while Austin Oviatt was Divisional Champion for Lead/Top Rope.
Outside of youth competitions, Joshua Jan competed in the Elite Series, and at USA Climbing National Team Trials finished the season ranked 11th out of all American Male speed climbers!
Men's Gymnastics
The MAC Men’s Gymnastics Team finished its most successful season since 2020. The past five years have been heavily focused on rebuilding; including coaching changes, a restructuring of our competitive levels, and increasing our competitive numbers from nine in 2020, to 22 this past season.
We are still a fairly young team but are steadily increasing our talent and skill levels to the point where we now have gymnasts successfully competing at the highest level in all three tiers of the junior levels, including: Compulsory, Club Track, and Optional.
All our athletes competed at State Championships and five qualified for Region 2 Championships in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The team’s two Level 9 gymnasts also qualified for Western National Championships in Reno, Nevada to finish off the competitive season at the end of April.
We held tryouts in May and are looking forward to adding at least four more talented and exciting athletes to the ranks.
The future is bright for the MAC Men’s Gymnastics Team!
Women's Gymnastics
The entire MAC Women’s Gymnastics staff is thrilled with our performance this year from all teams. We have been continuing to grow in numbers and are finally seeing gymnasts at the top levels for the first time since the pandemic. We are proud to say that 55 out of our 59 eligible athletes qualified for their respective State Competitions. We also had twice as many athletes make it to Xcel Regionals from the previous season. We had over 60 1st-3rd-place finishes at competitions throughout the season, several personal bests, and many new experiences. We were very excited to finish out such a great season with a trip to Fargo, North Dakota with our only Level 9, Julia Vanderhoff, who qualified for Western Nationals.
We are thrilled to be entering our off-season where we train for longer hours filled with fun, hard work, lots of strength, and many new skills!
— Coach Brin Noel
Artistic Swimming
The 2024-25 season has been successful so far, and the biggest competition for age group swimmers is yet to come. Three teams are attending the 2025 Junior Olympics in Arlington, Texas from June 27 to July 5, and the same three teams attended the USA Artistic Swimming West Zone Championships in March and qualified for U.S. Nationals. The junior program has been growing since the pandemic, and is currently the largest it’s ever been, with 56 swimmers!
Swimming
The MAC Junior Swim Team had an incredible Short Course season (Sept. 2024March 2025)! The team has grown over the years since coming out of the pandemic, working hard and smart together, and we continue to be a force to be reckoned with in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest. There were countless best times and improvements, many 1st-place finishes at our championship meets, and six new team records.
Not unlike MAC itself, the Swim Team is a small community that has banded together to work towards our shared goals. We recently hosted our first Long Course meet of the season and it is shaping up to be another successful year. Go MAC!
— Coach Tim Larkin
Basketball
The winter Junior Basketball season was a success, with all nine teams showing growth, teamwork, and sportsmanship. Players developed key skills and improved each week, creating a competitive and fun atmosphere. Coaches and families played a big role in the season’s positive energy. Several teams had strong records, and all made great strides in both individual and team performance. It was a memorable season that built confidence and excitement for future play.
Dance
The dance department has had an exciting and busy season. We have the highest number of dancers in the competitive program that we’ve ever had, and we are still growing. We ended our regional competition season in May and are preparing for our national competitions. This year, the Senior Company is attending Celebrity Dance Nationals in Las Vegas, Nevada, and our Junior Company dancers are attending Spotlight Dance Cup in Seaside, Oregon. The dancers have worked hard to qualify for these events, and we as a coaching staff are so proud of the work they have done. These dancers are going places! Auditions for the 2025-26 season were held on June 16, and we are excited for the upcoming competitions as well as our next season!
— Coach Maria Albaugh
Ski & Snowboard
The 2024-25 season marked the first season of our new recreational learning program, the Flying M’s Ski and Ride School, where we kicked off the inaugural season serving over 50 kids. Flying M’s offers two programs for children ages 4-14, a three-day holiday camp, and a season-long program, which allows members to begin with just a small commitment level, while also serving athletes all season. Flying M’s was designed to get MAC members involved in the MAC Ski & Snowboard program from an even younger age, and give them a fun and challenging group environment to learn with professional instruction.
The MAC Ski & Snowboard competitive team had a successful season both on the Alpine and Freeride side. We qualified 11 athletes from our Freeride Ski Team and Snowboard Team to the USASA National Championships in Copper Mountain, Colorado in April. Of those qualifiers, we had two USASA Mt. Hood Series Champions, and one athlete held a National Ranking of 2nd in their age category in the Half Pipe going into Nationals. Under our Alpine Racing umbrella, we had three junior athletes qualify for the Western Region Junior Championships. One athlete made the
PNW Alpine Team for the 2024-25 season, qualifying for one of only nine spots in the Pacific Northwest. Our YSL Team continues to improve and develop their skills on Mt. Hood in the Mt. Hood YSL Race Series, and this year we sent four U12 athletes to the PNW Buddy Werner U12 Championships
at Lookout Pass, Idaho. While this is not the biggest group we have ever sent to the Buddy Werner Championship, an event that MAC Ski & Snowboard has won on three separate occasions (2006, 2008, 2018), the stoke among these U12s and the whole YSL Team has never been higher!
Volleyball
MAC Volleyball had a standout 2024–25 season filled with travel, competition, tournament wins, and lasting memories. Our 12-1 team climbed to #8 in the region and finished 3rd at the Bayview Classic, while 12-2 jumped 16 spots to rank #47. MAC 14-1 won their flight in the Open Division at the prestigious MLK Seattle tournament, and 14-2 earned medals at the CEVA Cabin Fever tournament. Our 15-1 team fought hard all season, earning them a #48 finishing spot in the power league region. The 16-1 team had an exceptional run, winning seven tournaments, finishing #1 in Power League, taking 2nd at Regionals, and 2nd at the AAU Arizona Grand Prix. This year, we also launched our first college volleyball recruiting seminar and began exciting partnerships with local universities for beach volleyball and access to collegiate events. We’re proud of the progress our athletes have made and can’t wait to build on this momentum for an even stronger 2025–26 season!
