NMSA to select awardees for 2016

Robbie Schorr is among the nominees for the NMSA/TSL Foundation Male Student Athlete of the Year Award, which will be decided in tonight’s meeting of Northern Marianas Sports Association. (Roselyn B. Monroyo)

Northern Marianas Sports Association will meet tonight to select the top performers of 2016.

The association’s member federations will choose the winners of the Male and Female Athletes of the Year, NMSA/TSL Foundation Male and Female Student Athlete of the Year, Team of the Year, Administrator of the Year, Coach of the Year, and Technical Official of the Year awards.

All the monthly winners of the Male and Female Athletes of the Year and Student Athletes are nominated for the annual awards, but sports federation can still nominate those who did not make the monthly list. As for the other categories, nominations should be made in writing and must be submitted before tonight’s 7pm meeting. NMSA members are also reminded to pay the annual membership fee ($150), as failure to do so will bar them from casting their votes for the awardees.

Reigning NMSA/TSL Foundation Female Student Athlete of the Year Carol Lee of tennis leads the nominees for 2016, having won the monthly award three times last year (April, June, and August). Other nominees are tennis’ Isabel Heras (January) and Anika Camacho (November), swimming’s Mariana Batallones (February) and Ashley Dangol (March), and members of Saipan Paddling Club’s youth squad. NMSA will also accept as nominee the winner of the Female Athlete of the Month for December.

For the male student division, two-time monthly winners Lennosuke Suzuki (February and March) and tennis’ Robbie Schorr (June and August) top the nominees and are joined by athletics’ Jerald Castillo (June), soccer’s Rintaro Miyawaki (April), swimming’s Jinnosuke Suzuki (October), tennis’ Daniel Kang (November), basketball’s Jester Kintaro (May), and paddling’s Misaki Kitami (January).

For the Male and Female Athletes of the Year, the nominees are (men’s) Joshua Andrew, Bishop Ryan Jimenez, Douglas Schmidt, Salofi Welch, and Aaron Tomokane; (women’s) Zarinae Sapong, Harumi Suzuki, Sabrina Pangelinan, and Jennifer Cui.

For the Team of the Year, it will be a close battle among the CNMI All-Stars, the Marianas Outrigger Canoe Club’s Men’s Team, and the CNMI Junior Tennis Team. The CNMI All-Stars ruled the inaugural Micronesian Baseball Classic after pulling off a 15-14 thriller against rival Guam, while MOC’s men’s team reigned supreme in its division in the Mau Fatuul Classic and the 2016 Micronesian Cup in Palau. The Commonwealth’s junior tennis players, on the other hand, dominated the 2016 North Pacific Regional Championships and won the most medals in the 2016 Pacific Oceania Junior Championships held in Fiji, stunning perennial champion Tahiti.