Liana Tacconelli shined as a leader for the Santa Barbara High girls volleyball team. She’s been the team captain as a freshman, sophomore and senior, and three times received the Coach’s Award.
Tacconelli is a leader in the classroom, too.
She was honored as Santa Barbara’s Scholar Athlete of the Year Award at Monday’s Santa Barbara Athletic Round Table press luncheon at Harry’s Plaza Cafe.
The daughter of Carolene and Dr. Victor Tacconelli carries a 4.94 grade-point average while taking a course load that includes Advanced Placement Calculus, Art History, English Literature and Macro Economics.
Her academic awards include National Honor Society, California Scholarship Federation, AP Scholar with Distinction and SBCC School of Modern Languages Certification of Excellence.
She loves math and plans to focus on that subject at Lipscombe University in Nashville, Tenn.
One of her most memorable experiences while playing for the Dons was beating San Marcos in the Tournament of Champions after losing to their crosstown rivals twice in Channel League play. Making the victory extra special was the fact it was the 200th for coach John Gannon and his final game as coach of the Dons.
In addition to volleyball, Tacconelli’s extracurricular activities include tutoring and mentoring at Santa Barbara’s Academy for Success and serving on church missions in such faraway places as Indonesia, Honduras and Mexico. Her next mission trip is to Peru this summer.
— Noozhawk sports editor Barry Punzal can be reached at {encode=”bpunzal@noozhawk.com” title=”bpunzal@noozhawk.com”}. Follow Noozhawk Sports on Twitter: @NoozhawkSports. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.
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