ABOVE: Incoming high school senior, Ellie Ortega, on the court during a Fairmont High School volleyball game. Photo by Greg Abel.
FAIRMONT – Ellie Ortega, a returning senior and co-captain of the varsity volleyball team for Fairmont High School, focuses on team bonding and training in preparation for the upcoming season.
Ellie Ortega is a multi-sport athlete participating in basketball, track and field and volleyball. Volleyball was a late addition to her repertoire, picking up the sport her sophomore year due to COVID restrictions and finding success as a right-side hitter for the Cardinals and rising to the rank of co-captain over her now three-year career.
“It was during the COVID year, and when we could do floor sports, I decided to do volleyball,” said Ortega. “Then I found out that I really enjoyed it, and I decided to do that instead of cross-country.”
Coming off of a 4-18 season of volleyball last fall, Ellie Ortega is optimistic about her senior season and is focusing on building trust with her teammates.
“We need a lot of team bonding and just to trust each other,” she said. “So, Brylee [Miller], who’s the other team captain, helps me or she’s been kind of putting together our practices or our captains’ practices.”
Pete Ortega, Ellie’s father, stated that it’s her work ethic that sets her apart in all aspects of life. He said that when she puts her mind to something, it is a full commitment she doesn’t do anything halfway.
“Everything she does she works hard at,” he said. “I mean, she has such a great work ethic.
And that really is her competitive edge. It’s not necessarily that she may be the most outstanding shooter, runner, setter, whatever. It’s just that she works hard at what she
does. And that has done well for her athletically.”
Ellie Ortega has found a passion beyond sports that allows her to work with her hands and express her creativity through crafts, beginning with greeting cards for her grandparents. That has expanded into what she and her parents see as potential business, homemade soap.
“She’s very talented with arts and crafts. She’ll make cards, just beautiful cards, like handcrafted cards. And she started doing it for grandma and grandpa,” said Pete Ortega. “Then through encouragement through aunts and uncles, just continued to develop that. And so she’ll make very high-quality cards. And then that started to bleed over into soap making.”
Despite her love of sports ,Ellie Ortega plans to focus more on helping the community after high school. Planning to go to work for a camp affiliated with their church which last year hosted a total of 6,000 students.
“She’s a very generous person with her time, talents,” said Pete Ortega. “She’s very helpful to anything that needs to be helped with whether that’s around the house or at church or with just people in general. She’s always willing to help.”
Ellie Ortega plans to continue her work whether that be through her crafts, camp involvement, or generally just helping out the community even when the final whistle blows on her athletic career.