Sedona Red Rock High School’s girls basketball team is entering the upcoming season with high expectations. Coming off a year in which they qualified for state and with most of that year’s team back, the Scorpions are hoping for a deep postseason run. A state championship would be a picture-perfect end — which would be apt for one of the team’s top players, sophomore Helen Westervelt.
Westervelt is hoping to build off of a strong freshman season on the floor. Away from basketball, though, her interests are a little more mild, or even, in her own words, boring.
“I like to draw and paint a lot — I do a lot of art stuff in my free time,” she said. “I enjoy taking walks with my dogs and reading kind of boring stuff. That’s what I like to do.”
There’s nothing boring about Westervelt’s game. As a freshman, she was not only arguably her team’s top player, but one of the better players in the state. Westervelt [along with teammate Nyah Valdez] was named All-Region First Team in the 2A Central Region. Westervelt was also named Honorable Mention for the entire 2A Conference. Westervelt was also named Honorable Mention for the entire 2A Conference at the end of her freshman season.
Looking ahead at her sophomore season, Westervelt has a very lofty goal for the team and sees — or more appropriately, hears — a way that it can be achieved.
“Honestly, win state,” Westervelt said, when asked what her goals for the season were. “And have better communication. I know that we struggle with that a bit sometimes. When we’re passing or just in general, when we’re playing.”
“Many of the teams we were playing had older people — seniors and juniors. We had a bunch of freshmen. We were a very young team and that’s maybe what led to our communication not being as strong as other teams.”
Despite her own achievements as a freshman, Westervelt also hopes to continue to get better in certain areas of her game.
“I hope to be a better defender,” she said. “I’m not really that good on defense, so I definitely need to practice at it a little more. I also want to work on shooting more in the games. Last year I didn’t shoot as many outside shots as I hoped I would. I know now that I have more confidence from scrimmaging over the summer that I can shoot more during the games.”
While basketball is the only sport Westervelt is playing this school year, it’s not the only sport she’s played in her near two years at SRRHS. As a freshman, she started on the state quarterfinalist volleyball team. This year, with her sister, Mary, having graduated, she opted against doing that.
She has, though, considered playing another sport, which takes place on a much different surface than either a volleyball or basketball court.
“When I was little I used to play golf with my grandpa and I really enjoyed it,” Westervelt said. “So I might do that for a spring sport.”
As a sophomore, Westervelt has a decent amount of time to figure out what she wants to do after high school. Beyond a desire to go to Arizona State University, she’s currently not sure what she hopes will happen after her 2023 graduation. That includes not only whether she’d want to pursue continuing basketball but what she’d want to major in.
She has given at least one idea some thought, though.
“I was thinking that I’d kind of like to be a veterinarian,” Westervelt said. “My sister, Liza, wanted to be one at first when she was a freshman in college. Then she switched to pre-med. It just kind of interested me because I really do like animals.”
One thing about high school sports that remains uncertain is when spectators will be permitted back at games. It’s something that could happen again this winter, or possibly not again until spring or even the 2021-22 school year.
When fans are allowed back at games, though, Westervelt wants them to know that they’ll be seeing a person whose effort will always be there whether on the court or in the classroom.
“I’m a hard working student,” she said. “I don’t really slack off. I try my best in school and on the field, too.”
