My-Anh Holmes, a four-time state tennis champion from The Willow School, was selected as the Allstate Sugar Bowl’s Outstanding Female Athlete from the New Orleans area for 2024-25. The New Orleans Sports Awards Committee, sponsored by the Allstate Sugar Bowl, selects annual award winners in a variety of categories; it also selects Amateur Athletes of the Month and each year’s New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame class.
Holmes (first name pronounced Me-Ahn) dominated her competition in the LHSAA Division II state tennis championship bracket. The senior dropped just three games in five matches as she blazed her way to her fourth straight state championship. Holmes posted 6-0, 6-0 wins in the first three rounds of the state tournament before dropping a game to Ben Franklin’s Mallory Kymes in the semifinals. Her championship match came against a familiar opponent – her younger sister My-Linh, also of Willow. In a rematch of last year’s state final, the elder Holmes prevailed, 6-2, 6-0 (last year’s result was 6-1, 6-0).
“My-Anh is exactly the type of player every coach dreams of leading their team,” said Willow coach Gian Balsamo. “She is coachable and helpful to her teammates. She plays with great tenacity and her tactical intelligence on a tennis court is outstanding. I am very honored to have been a part of her journey through her four years of high school at The Willow School and I will miss her greatly.”
Last year, Holmes dropped a total of three games en route to the state title. In her 2023 championship run, she lost just one game and as a freshman in 2022, she lost just two games – in four years of state title appearances, she has posted a game record of 228-9 in 19 matches. Holmes, who is listed by the U.S. Tennis Association as the top-ranked 18-and-under girls tennis player in Louisiana (and top 50 in the country), has signed to continue her career at UC Santa Barbara in the fall.
The other finalists for New Orleans’ Outstanding Female Athlete honor were Stella Junius (Mount Carmel Soccer/Cross Country/Track & Field), Sierra Sacco (Mississippi State Softball), Luci Schroeder (Xavier University Soccer), and Leah Varisco (Scared Heart Cross Country/Track & Field/Basketball). Junius, the Cubs;’ team captain scored 18 goals and dished out 10 assists during the run to a Division I state championship. Sacco, a graduate of John Curtis Christian School, earned First-Team All-America honors after hitting .450 to lead the Bulldogs to a 39-19 record. Schroeder, a senior midfielder from Germany, was selected as the top women’s soccer player in Louisiana for the second straight year after scoring 14 goals and 17 assists in 21 games to lead Xavier to the NAIA National Tournament. Varisco keyed four different Sacred Heart teams to at least sixth place finishes in the state this year as a junior, including helping the Cardinals to the state title game in basketball for the first time in school history.
The New Orleans Sports Awards Committee came together when James Collins spearheaded a group of sports journalists to form a sports awards committee to immortalize local sports history. For 13 years, the committee honored local athletes each month and a variety of annual award winners. In 1970, the Sugar Bowl stepped in to sponsor and revitalize the committee, leading to the creation of the New Orleans Sports Hall of Fame in 1971, honoring 10 legends from the Crescent City in its first induction class. While adding the responsibility of selecting Hall of Famers, the committee has continued to recognize the top athlete in the Greater New Orleans area each month as well as a range of annual awards – the honors enter their 69th year in 2025.
The Allstate Sugar Bowl has established itself as one of the premier college football bowl games, having hosted 29 national champions, 110 Hall of Fame players, 55 Hall of Fame coaches and 21 Heisman Trophy winners in its 91-year history. The 92nd Allstate Sugar Bowl Football Classic, which will double as a College Football Playoff Quarterfinal, is scheduled to be played on January 1, 2026. In addition to football, the Sugar Bowl Committee annually invests over $1 million into the community through the hosting and sponsorship of sporting events, awards, scholarships and clinics. Through these efforts, the organization supports and honors thousands of student-athletes each year, while injecting over $2.5 billion into the local economy in the last decade.
-www.AllstateSugarBowl.org-
