Our All-City Athletes of the Year award has been around for nine years, just a fraction of the 120+ year history of amazing youth athletes in Long Beach. But over the last decade we’ve gotten a good look at the top flight of the city’s talent pool: previous recipients of this award have been NFL Pro Bowlers, Olympians, NCAA Freshmen of the Year, and first-round NBA Draft picks. In the last year, former honorees JuJu Smith-Schuster and Peyton Watson claimed NFL and NBA championships.
This year’s honorees are sure to carry the All-City banner proudly into the future. This year’s duo recognizes two of the city’s deepest and best traditions: aquatics and track and field, as well as the two oldest schools in the city with Poly and Wilson.
Our girls’ honoree is Aujane Luckey, Wilson’s state champ and nationally acclaimed runner who’s headed to Arizona State after leading her team to historic titles. She’s the fifth track and field athlete honored so far. On the boys’ side it’s Poly’s Colin Geer, who delivered a historic league title before going on to make history at the CIF-SS and CIF State levels.
Girls’ All-City Athlete of the Year: Aujane Luckey, Wilson Track & Field
It was obvious from the first day she set foot on Wilson’s campus that Aujane Luckey was a special athlete.
Her coaches said her athleticism was obvious, but so was her willingness to be a great teammate and sacrifice for the greater good. After her historic high school career wrapped up, she immediately began preparing for college where she’ll be a similarly impactful athlete at Arizona State, after picking the Sun Devils over Oregon, Texas A&M, and many others.
“It felt like home, just like the environment I’m in now,” said Luckey on her decision to become a Sun Devil. “I love the program, I love what they do at their school and just me feeling safe there was an automatic plus, so it was only right. I love the coaches, I love their program, I love how they do everything–it’s similar to Wilson.”
As expected, Luckey was the top girls’ athlete at the Moore League meet, then went on to an excellent postseason. She won the CIF-SS title in the 400 and took third in the 200, and also ran strong legs on championship 4×100 and 4×400 relays. She helped lead the Bruins to their first CIF-SS team title since 2006.
Luckey continued that run as she helped lead her team to their first state title–and the first state title by any Wilson program–since 2006. Luckey won the state title in the 400, scored points in the 200, and helped lead a strong 4×100 and 4×400 performance as well.
Boys’ All-City Athlete of the Year: Colin Geer, Long Beach Poly Swim
Long Beach Poly’s Colin Geer set a goal as a freshman that he’d make history, and help lead the Poly boys’ swim team to a Moore League win over Wilson. Plenty of athletes make similar goals, but Geer’s was a little different: Wilson had the longest league title streak in California history in any sport.
This year he made good on that goal, leading Poly to its first-ever Moore League swim title and stopping the historic Wilson streak at 49 years. Now he’s heading to the University of Michigan, after making a lifetime of memories in the water in high school. His performance was praised on stage by the school’s principal at graduation–not often does swimming come up during the Poly ceremony.
The league meet was not the end of Geer’s successful senior career. He made history in the postseason as well. Geer won individual CIF-SS and CIF State titles in the 200 IM. He’s the first Long Beach swimmer in the modern era to win a State title, and he set a new CIF-SS Division 1 record in the event as well.
“He’s been the greatest leader you could ever ask for in a high school athlete,” Poly swim coach Ish Pluton said.
“Swimming at Poly was amazing and I’m so glad my teammates and I could accomplish our goals,” he said. “That (league meet) was a night I know I’ll never forget.”
All-City Athlete of the Year Honorees
2014: JuJu Smith-Schuster, Ariana Washington
2015: Daniel McArthur, Imani McDonald
2016: Jack Jones, Ali Morallos
2017: Sam Lewis, Ayanna Clark
2018: Tyler Schafer, Ariyonna Augustine
2019: Will Frankenfeld, Rachel Glenn
2020: Peyton Watson, Tiare Jennings
2021: Hank Rivers, Jade McDonald
2022: Gray Carson, Laura Williams & Adonia Faumuina
2023: Colin Geer, Aujane Luckey
