When Washington athletic director Allison Jones was filling out Beth Batchelor’s nomination for the Pat Gainey Student Scholarship Award she had so much to write about she was scared it wouldn’t get read at all. It did. And the NCHSAA judges probably only needed to read about half of it before deciding that Batchelor would be the perfect choice to win the $2,000 scholarship which is handed out to two best student athletes in the state.

“The North Carolina Athletic Association offers a few scholarships through its website and they take applications from all over the entire state and when I read the description for the Pat Gainey award I had no problem nominating Beth,” Jones said. “Actually, when I was writing the nomination I went on and on and on for pages and I thought ‘they won’t even open this; I have to stop and focus.’”

Jones’ biggest challenge was the fact that trying to highlight just some of the three-sport star’s accomplishments is like trying pick your favorite Jordan dunk or Chris Johnson runs; there’s just too many.

A good place to start would be the fact that the Pam Pack senior is a two-time Coastal Conference Player of the Year in tennis, a two-time WDN all-area first-team basketball player and an all-state selection in soccer, the sport that Batchelor will be playing when she attends East Carolina University next season.

Batchelor, whose 104 career goals is the most in Washington High School history, also dominates in the classroom where she ranks in the top five of her senior class and is the president of the Student Government Association at Washington.

“We just felt like when we read the description of the Pat Gainey award that Beth Batchelor epitomized what an outstanding student athlete was,” Jones said.

Beth received the award last Thursday at the annual NCHSAA athletic meeting at the Dean E. Smith Center where she was accompanied by her parents Bill and Augusta Batchelor, along with Jones and Washington soccer coach Jimmy Kozuch.

“I feel very honored to be chosen,” Batchelor said. “I just appreciate that I was considered for the award.”

Kozuch said Batchelor was the perfect choice.

“I thought she was very deserving of the award. The Pat Gainey award is for the best student athlete and I thought there was no question she was the right pick,” Kozuch said. “Her leadership is second to none. She is a natural leader, everybody sees her doing the right thing and then they get on board … The amount that she has meant to the team is unmeasurable. Her overall attitude is amazing and her work ethic is truly remarkable. It’s been great to have her at practice everyday.”

Batchelor played her final soccer game for the Pack this Tuesday when the team lost 3-1 to Currituck in the first round of the NHCSAA 3-A playoffs. Batchelor, who scored the team’s lone goal, said she will miss her teammates.

“I will miss not being able to play with the girls again, it was a lot of fun,” Batchelor said.