New York High School Athlete of the Week: How Voting Works & How to Win

What is the New York High School Athlete of the Week?

The New York High School Athlete of the Week is a free weekly fan poll published by High School on SI — the prep-sports vertical of Sports Illustrated, operated by SBLive — at si.com/high-school/new-york. Each week of the NYSPHSAA athletic calendar, the SI editorial team selects a ballot of outstanding performers from across the state and opens it to a public vote. The programme spans all eleven sections of the New York State Public High School Athletic Association and every classification, from the largest Division I football programmes on Long Island to small rural schools competing in Class D.

• Hosted at si.com/high-school/new-york, a national sports platform with audience reach well beyond any single regional newspaper.
• Covers all three NYSPHSAA sports seasons — fall, winter, and spring — and recognises athletes from all sports within each season.
• Both boys and girls Athlete of the Week polls are published weekly during the active season.
• Voting is free with no account, no email, and no registration required; multiple votes are permitted during the open window.
• The poll closes each Friday at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time (2:59 a.m. ET Saturday morning).
• New York athletes compete in the national SI poll as well — Natalya Horton (La Salle Institute, Troy) and Samantha Maleck (Marlboro HS) each won the national Girls Athlete of the Week poll during the 2025–26 season, demonstrating the state's depth.

A win earns the athlete a published mention across the Sports Illustrated High School platform — a national outlet with far broader digital reach than any single regional New York paper — which surfaces in recruiting searches and college coach correspondence.

Which New York schools and NYSPHSAA sections compete in this poll?

High School on SI nominates athletes from across all eleven NYSPHSAA sections, with representation reflecting both population density and athletic tradition. The table below lists fourteen prominent programmes across the state's major regions — from the Catholic high school leagues of New York City and Long Island to the large suburban publics of the Capital District and the powerhouse programmes of Central and Western New York.

New York City and Long Island schools compete in the Catholic High School Football League (CHSFL) alongside their public school counterparts, creating some of the most competitive nomination pools on the entire platform. St. Anthony's (South Huntington) and Cardinal Hayes (Bronx) have long histories of producing nationally ranked football and basketball programmes, while Iona Prep draws from Westchester's dense suburban talent base.

Upstate, the picture shifts: the Capital District's Section II features Shenendehowa — one of the state's largest single-building high schools with enrolment above 2,700 — alongside the academically and athletically distinguished La Salle Institute in Troy. Section III around Syracuse houses Christian Brothers Academy and Cicero-North Syracuse, which are perennial contenders across football, lacrosse, and basketball. Rochester's Section V features Aquinas Institute, a Catholic school with a national reputation in football, and Bishop Kearney's strong basketball and swimming programmes. Buffalo's Section VI anchors Western New York, with Williamsville East among the most decorated suburban athletics programmes in the Niagara Frontier.

How does the High School on SI New York Athlete of the Week vote work?

The poll lives inside the High School Sports section at si.com/high-school/new-york and is completely free to participate in — no Sports Illustrated subscription, no SBLive account, and no email address required. The embedded poll widget displays each nominee's name, school, sport, and a brief performance description alongside live vote totals that update throughout the window. For a general primer on how online publication fan polls function, see our guide to online contest voting.

Unlike newspaper polls with strict hourly vote caps, the High School on SI platform permits multiple votes per device during the open window. This means the total vote ceiling is higher and a well-organised campaign can accumulate much larger totals than a capped-once-per-hour publication poll. Votes from any device and any geographic location count equally — family members in other states or countries cast the same weight as local votes.

What does the voting window look like?

Polls typically open on Monday or Tuesday when the SI editorial team publishes the weekly ballot article. The window runs until Friday at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time — that is 2:59 a.m. ET on Saturday morning. The exact article and poll link appear at si.com/high-school/new-york; searching "New York athlete of the week vote" in the current week surfaces the active ballot. For timing and tactics relevant to any online fan poll in New York, the New York contest hub has additional context.

How is the New York Athlete of the Week winner decided?

Once the SI editorial team publishes the weekly ballot, the outcome is determined entirely by fan vote total — the nominee with the highest count when the poll closes on Friday night wins. The editorial desk shapes the ballot (who appears on it) but does not adjust, weight, or override the vote result after opening.

1. Nomination: coaches, parents, school contacts, and fans submit outstanding performances to the High School on SI editorial team via the contact or nomination form on the site, typically covering Friday night through Sunday results.
2. Ballot curation: the SI prep-sports staff reviews submissions alongside their own tracking of scores and stats across all eleven NYSPHSAA sections, then selects the weekly nominee shortlist by editorial judgement.
3. Open vote: the ballot article goes live, usually Monday or Tuesday, at si.com/high-school/new-york and remains open until Friday 11:59 p.m. PT.
4. Winner announced: the athlete with the highest vote total is recognised as the New York High School Athlete of the Week across si.com, the Sports Illustrated High School social channels, and the weekly results article.

Because recognition appears on Sports Illustrated — a brand with national credibility in American sports media — a win carries more weight on a college recruiting profile or bio than a local-paper mention alone.

Building votes for a New York High School on SI Athlete of the Week nominee

Because the High School on SI platform does not enforce a strict hourly cap — multiple votes per device per session are permitted — total vote accumulation depends on network breadth and sustained engagement across the full window. The fundamentals: put the direct ballot article link (not just the athlete's name) in front of every realistic network as early as possible, then repeat the outreach in the final 24 hours. See our detailed vote campaign guide and the buy-votes explainer for general tactics; the New York-specific dynamics below reflect what actually moves in this market.

Two NY-specific patterns produce outsized results. First, New York City and Long Island Catholic school networks — particularly at CHSFL programmes like St. Anthony's, Cardinal Hayes, Iona Prep, and Chaminade — combine tight alumni communities with large current student bodies, multiple sports teams voting cross-sport, and active parent associations. A single push through a CHSFL booster WhatsApp group can reach hundreds of voting-age alumni and parents within minutes. Second, upstate suburban communities around Shenendehowa (Clifton Park), Cicero-North Syracuse, and the Monroe County schools have deep neighbourhood Facebook and NextDoor engagement where a poll link circulates widely once posted by a community-connected parent.

When every reachable organic network has been activated and a nominee is still trailing, some campaigns turn to paid vote promotion services to reach additional genuine voters across the remaining window. If you take that route, our sports fan poll votes service delivers real, paced votes matched to a pace that looks organic — rapid bot injections are the pattern platforms flag and remove.

Rules, fair play, and the buy-votes question for this poll

High School on SI is a reader-engagement fan poll with no cash prize, no formal sweepstakes framework, and no NYSPHSAA official standing. The relevant restrictions are the SBLive/SI platform's own technical terms — primarily prohibitions on automated tools, bots, and scripts that circumvent or flood the voting interface. For a broader look at legality across different poll types, see our comprehensive guide; the specifics below relate to this platform.

The distinction that matters in practice is between two structurally different types of activity:

• Automated bots and scripts — tools that fire rapid-fire requests ignoring normal user behaviour patterns, easily identifiable by traffic-analysis tools as non-human. These violate platform terms, are detectable, and produce removable vote inflation.
• Paid outreach to real human voters — real people, on real devices, casting genuine clicks through the normal interface. This is structurally identical to a booster club email reaching five hundred additional families who then each vote — it is more fans voting, reached through a different distribution channel.

Whether that distinction satisfies the spirit of any particular version of the platform's terms is a judgement each family, booster, or athlete must make after reviewing the current official poll page. The practical risk in this format — a publication fan poll with no prize and no sports-governing-body sanction — is reputational, not legal. Weigh that honestly against the genuine credential value a Sports Illustrated win provides.

NYSPHSAA season timeline and when to run your vote campaign

The High School on SI New York poll runs throughout each of the three NYSPHSAA-recognised athletic seasons. The competitive intensity of any given week's ballot shifts with the sports calendar — football and basketball draw the state's most organised fan bases, while spring track, lacrosse, and baseball weeks can turn on a much smaller vote differential. The table below maps the SI poll cadence to New York's actual athletic year.

The voting window within each week is consistent: polls open Monday or Tuesday at si.com/high-school/new-york and close Friday at 11:59 p.m. PT. Always verify the close time on the active ballot article itself — SI adjusts for holidays and tournament weeks. The maximum sustainable vote-building window is roughly 80–100 hours if you activate your networks on day one.

Fall is the most fiercely contested season. October football weeks involving CHSFL and Section VIII Long Island programmes regularly produce the year's highest single-ballot totals — organised alumni networks, large student bodies, and strong social-media followings combine to drive votes at a scale that spring or winter ballots rarely match unless a breakthrough performance captures statewide attention. That said, spring lacrosse weeks on Long Island and in Central New York can surprise: Section II and Section III produce nationally ranked lacrosse programmes whose communities are tightly knit and highly competitive.

For context on other New York school and community recognition contests, visit the New York contest hub. For all US athlete-of-the-week guides, see the USA contest guide index.