Organ Mountain's Ashley Galaz voted best Las Cruces-area girls athlete in 2025-26 season

Readers have voted Organ Mountain cross country's Ashley Galaz as the best Las Cruces-area girls high school athlete from the 2025-26 season.

Galaz was among 25 nominees from Las Cruces, Mayfield, Organ Mountain, Centennial, and Gadsden across volleyball, soccer, basketball, track and field, cross country, softball, swimming, wrestling, tennis, powerlifting, and golf. The poll ran from June 17-30.

Galaz nearly earned a majority of the vote, finishing with 49.45% of the total, 70,311 votes. Gadsden track and field's Melanie Gaytan finished second with 41,109 votes, and Las Cruces wrestling's Autiana Caro came third in the voting with 26,525 votes.

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Galaz qualified for the poll due to her excellent 2025 cross-country campaign for the Knights. The freshman was Organ Mountain's highest finisher at every event the school competed in and won four events. One of those was the District 3-5A meet, where she won an individual district championship to help the Knights' girls team win a team district championship. Galaz finished with a time of 19:47.69 at the district meet, which was more than a minute ahead of second-place Arabella Richardson of Mayfield at 20:48.9.

The other three cross-country events that Galaz won in 2025 were the Mayfield Invitational (18:42.59), the Belen Adron Gardner Cross Country Classic (19:56.16) and the Centennial Invitational (21:00.43). She then earned a third-place finish in the 5A meet at the NMAA Cross Country State Championships with a time of 19:22.2.

Galaz followed that up with a stellar track season in 2026. She finished first in the 1600 and 3200 meters at the Centennial Hawks Invitational, and first in the 1600 meters and the 4x800 relay (alongside Paetyn Goodman, Jaymie McBroom and Lena Coombs) at the Mayfield John Mirimanian Invitational. Galaz then won a District 3-5A individual title in the 1600 meters before competing at the NMAA 5A State Track and Field Championships and the Under Armor Track & Field Nationals.

This article originally appeared on Las Cruces Sun-News: Organ Mountain's Ashley Galaz voted best Las Cruces-area girls athlete in 2025-26 season