BLOGS

Kelsea Azurdia perseveres through road blocks

Blog: The Wildcat Word

Kelsea Azurdia has been through a lot in her basketball career.
She's lost one of her closest friends. She's battled the effects of a severe concussion. She's even had a tumor removed from her knee.
But that's not what her senior basketball season with the Eastmont Wildcats has been about. All season long, Azurdia has been one of the main leaders for a young Wildcats squad.
Basketball has long been a big part of Azurdia's life. Her father, Marco Azurdia, is the former coach at Wenatchee Valley College, and she was a part of a successful Wenatchee AAU team along with current Wenatchee High School star Dani Hallberg. But things started to slowly unravel for Azurdia as she started to enter high school.
Mikayla Talbot, her close friend and teammate, died in a car crash in 2006. Then, as a freshman on Wenatchee's JV team, Azurdia suffered a severe concussion that nearly derailed her athletic career.
She wasn't cleared to play her sophomore year, but she eventually resurfaced at Eastmont as a junior, only to injure her knee in practice before the Wildcats' first game. Doctors found a tumor inside her kneecap, and after surgery, Azurdia was forced to miss another basketball season — even summer ball.
That's all over now, though.
Azurdia has made it through the entire season on the Wildcats' roster, and has been one of the more reliable members of the team.
"It feels great (to be playing again)," Azurdia says. "This year I think I've given it all I've got."
"She's a great leader for our team," Eastmont coach Brent Darnell says. "I always tease her that if she didn't have bad luck she wouldn’t have any luck, but she never quits."
Though she may be a step slower than she once was, having a basketball mind like hers on the floor is invaluable.
"I'm slower, but that doesn't mean my heart's not in it," Azurdia says.
"Kelsea may not be the athlete she once was, but she is definitely a smart basketball player," says Darnell. "As a coach the toughest thing to a kid is vision, but she gets it. ... She's been great for (our guards)."