PCC Softball’s Riker-Sloan To Receive California Community College Counselors / Advisors Academic Association Achievement Award

Pasadena City College softball player Holly Riker-Sloan is the 2016 recipient of the CCCAA 3CFA Achievement Award. The prestigious annual state award is generated by the California Community College Counselors/Advisors Academic Association to go to a student-athlete who has overcome significant personal/and or family challenges to succeed in spite of these obstacles.

Currently playing as the starting catcher on the Lancers, Riker-Sloan is expected to be in attendance at the CCCAA Spring Convention held next Wednesday, Mar. 30 at the Doubletree Hotel in Ontario. Various members of the PCC Athletics staff will be in attendance as well in support of Riker-Sloan’s achievement.

Riker-Sloan was an All-Southern California Region selection as a freshman when she tied for the PCC school record for most home runs in a season with 10. Now, PCC’s all-time leader in round-trippers (11), Riker-Sloan has helped the team to a 16-12 record thus far in 2016.

Riker-Sloan’s challenges are health-related as she has had her playing/academic career halted at times due to an autoimmune disorder that affected her kidneys. She suffered a series of setbacks off and on that she has battled to overcome since she first became ill as a senior at Gahr High in 2008. It culminated in her receiving a kidney transplant in July, 2013.

Even after her All-South Coast Conference First Team 2015 season with the Lancers, she was dealt with another health crisis that nearly kept her from playing this year. Her body began to reject the new kidney and she was hospitalized as her immune system was affected.

Riker-Sloan wrote in a letter to the award committee about her most recent hardship, “I told myself that I could accept not being able to play because of my health, but I couldn’t accept not being able to play because of my grades. So I put school above everything else. Sitting in the clinic for six hours while receiving IVIG was time I was not willing to waste. I would work on homework and projects while everybody else receiving infusions there slept.”

Riker-Sloan’s hard work and perseverance allowed her to earn a 4.0 GPA in the fall semester. After several IV treatments, she became healthy again as she resumed practicing for the ’16 season.

“To go through what she has endured is really inspiring,” said PCC Associate Athletic Director/Compliance and counselor, Dr. Michael McClellan. “Her determination in her studies in order to get back to playing is something few in life could have pulled off, or even would have wanted to attempt in the first place. She is a courageous young woman.”

Riker-Sloan credited PCC’s Stan Gray Academic Athletic Zone and Dr. McClellan’s counseling staff as helping her map a road to educational success. She further credits PCC softball head coach Monica Tantlinger and her assistant staff with supporting her efforts and giving her the opportunity to play college softball, a childhood dream of Riker-Sloan.

She would like to become a physical therapist after completing her college education.