Big Sky soccer player Madison Montgomery shows grit on the field and in the classroom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Madison Montgomery makes excelling on and off the soccer field look easy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
She’ll tell you that it takes personal commitment and support from her team to pull it off\u2014and at Northern Arizona University, the defender from Chandler has benefited from both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In March 2021, she was named Big Sky Soccer Offensive Player of the Week<\/a>, her first career Player of the Week honor. As a sophomore, Madison earned Big Sky All-Conference honors for the Lumberjacks soccer team<\/a>. It was a fitting campaign after she worked her way into significant playing time during her freshman year and earned NAU\u2019s Golden Eagle Scholar-Athlete Award, which recognized her contributions to the sport while maintaining at least a 3.0 GPA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI was proud that I could push through,\u201d she said. \u201cCoach told me he was proud of me for staying on top of everything and working hard every practice. That made me confident and helped me be the player and person I am now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n At NAU, the athletic staff cares about you as a person. They care about your future. It\u2019s a great place to be. I\u2019m a person, not just another body to put on the field.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Madison credits NAU Athletics<\/a> for emphasizing schoolwork.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOur coaches always have pushed academics,\u201d she said. \u201cStudent comes before athlete, and they say we need to get our work done. We know soccer isn\u2019t going to be part of our lives forever. At NAU, the athletic staff cares about you as a person. They care about your future. It\u2019s a great place to be. I\u2019m a person, not just another body to put on the field.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Current head coach Kylie Louw is an inspiration to Madison, not just for how she relates to her players but also for her experience as an Olympian on the South African national team.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cShe\u2019s been a great mentor to me and has played a big role in me continuing to improve as a soccer player and person,\u201d Madison said. \u201cShe challenges us every day to be the best that we can be. She pushes the idea of being part of something bigger and being a part of a family, which I find really cool.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n A Biomedical Science<\/a> major and Psychology<\/a> minor, Madison is considering medical school in the future. She knows the time and determination forged on the NAU soccer field will help her achieve her personal and professional goals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBiomedical science is a very competitive field,\u201d she said. \u201cSo the competitiveness of soccer\u2014working hard, putting your head down, and making sure you get your work done\u2014is helpful. Even if you\u2019re doubting yourself or people are doubting you, keep working hard, keep grinding. I finally found out I could be the player I knew I could be.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Big Sky soccer player Madison Montgomery shows grit on the field and in the classroom.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":316,"featured_media":2179,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,2],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2178"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/316"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2178"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2178\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5321,"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2178\/revisions\/5321"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legacy.nau.edu\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}