Three Arizona female athletes awarded $10,000 NIL deals

MESA, AZ (AZFamily) — Arizona Athletic Grounds is one of the biggest sports and entertainment facilities in the country. The sports complex in Mesa has more than 150 courts and fields that are used on an annual basis by millions of athletes – young and old, amateur and professional.

AAG’s most impressive number yet might be the amount of money it’s handing out to a trio of female student-athletes from Arizona.

Kenley Horton, Audrey Jimenez and Tatum Thomason are Arizona Athletic Grounds’ inaugural “Girls First” ambassadors. Each received $10,000 after winning an online voting contest that sought out collegiate student-athletes who have exceptional athletic abilities and have left impactful marks on their local communities.

“For us to choose three female student-athletes at different universities at different points in their career from different sports and different backgrounds, we wanted to make sure that we’re putting in front of young girls the opportunity to see maybe where they want to go,” AAG President Meg Stevens said.

Horton, who went to Campo Verde High School in Gilbert, is a freshman volleyball player at Benedictine University Mesa. Jimenez, a product of Sunnyside High School in Tucson, is a freshman wrestler at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania. Thomason, a graduate of Liberty High School in Peoria, is a junior on the University of Washington soccer team.

“I see all the little girls after our games like lined up, waiting for autographs from us,” Thomason said. “I just remember when I was a little girl and I would go to like the ASU, U of A soccer games, I would be one of those girls, waiting like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m gonna get to meet a college player, like this is the best day ever.’ Those girls can look up to me and be like, ‘I want to continue playing so I could be like her.’”

AAG hopes its student-athlete leaders will empower and inspire the young girls who play at its facilities every weekend to continue competing for a long time.

According to the Aspen Institute’s National State of Play 2024 Report, the participation in sports of girls ages 6-17 is growing, but at 35.6% nationwide, it is still less than boys the same age (41.6%).

“There’s so much that comes from staying in it,” Thomason said. “So many life experiences and lessons.”

“I’ve traveled to eight different countries already,” Jimenez said. “I’m able to come to college because of wrestling. The people I’ve met and the challenges I faced and had to overcome like through with wrestling, I feel like it’s just made me a stronger person and it’s just giving me a lot of perspective that I can take off of the mat and into just life.”

“It’s not about wanting to just go pro; it’s about that being a young girl involved in sports will actually help you throughout your career,” Stevens said.

A 2024 study by the Women’s Sports Foundation found more than two-thirds (69.1%) of women who played youth sports held leadership roles outside of the family, and nearly half (48.0%) are leaders in their workplace. Of those holding formal leadership roles, more than 70% have a title including “manager, director, president or a C-suite title like CEO.”

“It’s not what you played; it’s not how good you were; it’s that you played," Stevens said.

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