Bad breaks: Airport's Ortega battles through injury-filled year

CARLETON – First it was the club.

Then came the mask.

The final unwanted addition to Cecelia Ortega’s uniform was a boot.

This isn’t how she wanted to end her high school career.

The Airport senior endured injury after injury but kept coming back and refused to let misfortune break her spirit.

“All you can do in life is deal with the cards you are dealt,” she said. “You can’t go back and change no matter how bad you want to. All you can do is look for what lessons you can learn from it.”

Most of the lessons Ortega has learned during the 2023-24 school year have been the painful kind.

It all started during a summer soccer game when she broke her right arm.

“It wasn’t that profound of a play,” she said. “I was challenging for the ball and had my arm up on my chest. The girl ran into me, and my arm got smushed between us.

“I didn’t think much about it at first. I just kept playing. After a while I thought, ‘This really hurts.’ So, I called for a sub.”

A trip to the doctor confirmed what Ortega already knew – her arm was broken.

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She missed the first few meets of the cross country season but returned in time to combine with teammate Courtney Bovair to win one of the most prestigious meets of the season – the Frank Connolly Relays at Erie Mason.

She was running with a cast on her broken arm.

“Honestly, I don’t think the cast slowed me down as much as the time off,” she said. “I had three weeks off without any conditioning or any running. That was heartbreaking. All summer I had been getting good times running on my own.”

The broken arm wasn’t the only setback Ortega had to deal with during cross country season.

“She had a hip injury towards the end of the season,” cross country coach Mark Bovair said. “She battled through it and had a real solid finish.”

Ortega, who believes running with the cast caused the hip ailment, wound up finishing 13th at the Huron League championships.

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“I think we had a really good season,” said the daughter of Christina and Marc Ortega of Carleton. “This was the first time I’ve run cross country in high school. I loved the people on her team.”

And her teammates loved her.

That’s a constant over all of Ortega’s sports.

It’s a big reason why she was named captain of Airport’s girls basketball team.

“I was coming off a (junior) season where I didn’t play a lot,” she said. “That (being named captain) really surprised me. It was definitely very nice.”

Basketball coach Darrell Mossburg says Ortega should not have been surprised by the vote.

“She has really a focused, goal-oriented mindset,” Mossburg said. “She has a great personality and is a team-first person. Cecelia is awesome.”

But Ortega’s luck wasn’t any better when the winter season began.

She re-broke her arm early in the season and sat out 19 games before returning for the district tournament.

“I came back at the end of the season,” she said. “I probably shouldn’t have, but I really wanted to play. I had a foam brace on it, but I was basically playing left-handed.”

The natural right-hander made two free throws in her first game back with her left hand.

It was then that another stroke of bad luck slammed into Ortega.

In her second game back, she collided with another player and suffered a broken nose. She was taken to the hospital and missed Airport’s district championship celebration.

That left her wearing a soft cast on her arm and a mask on her face in the spring when she started her favorite high school sport – soccer.

“Oh my gosh, I felt so silly, but I was extremely grateful to be able to play,” she said. “My teammates made it better. They said I was so scary I looked like Batman.”

Airport’s Batman was knocked out of the lineup by another injury.

“I am taking a couple of games off now because I’m in a boot,” she said. “I had shin splits so bad I couldn’t walk.”

Ortega hopes to return later this week hasn't abandoned her team while she heals. She still attends every practice and game – just like did in basketball and cross country when she was sidelined.

“It shows how big her heart is,” Airport girls soccer coach Harold Mendez said. “The first thing she told me was, ‘Coach, I can’t play for two weeks, but I am going to be there for my teammates.’ She is mentally strong and dedicated.

“She is very bubbly and very positive about things. She is hard on herself, but when it comes to her teammates, she knows how to pick them up.”

Added Bovair, “She brings a lot of energy to the team. She boosted the morale of the team. She was there every meet cheering the team. She’s a real light.”

Ironically, Ortega can’t recall suffering any serious injuries before this season.

“This is pretty new to me,” she said. “I’ve had minor injuries before – shin splints and a minor hip problem. Never anything this serious.”

Ortega may play club sports in college but wants to concentrate on her studies. She plans to become a civil engineer.

She is taking a philosophical view of her challenging senior year.

“I’ve learned a lot of things” she said. “I’ve taken a lot of things for granted in the past. … You always want more time to play basketball or run.

“I might have stopped sooner than I want to. I want to take very game from here on out like it is my last, because it very well could be.”

This article originally appeared on The Monroe News: Bad breaks: Airport's Ortega battles through injury-filled year