In the span of 25 minutes and approximately 2,900 juggles, Lea Gentry wrote her own allegory.
Gentry obliterated the preseason juggling test administered by Denver North head coach Clay Porter. Gentry’s nearly half-hour spectacle of soccer skill left Porter amazed, but not necessarily surprised, given how Gentry juggles the various balls of her life.
“She never gets overwhelmed,” Porter observed. “In that (juggling test), she was fluid. There weren’t really any scrambles. That ball stayed about 6 inches off her foot for about 25 minutes, and it’s just a testament to the amount of time and effort she has put into her game. She worked her (tail) off to do that in that moment that day, like she has done to become such a great player in competition.
“… And that’s not unlike everything she does, where excellence is always a common thread.”
A quick recap of Gentry’s impressive resume: Star soccer player signed to Oregon State. All-state flag football player. A 4.98 GPA and an extensive list of community service. That complete package is why the Vikings’ centerpiece is the winner of The Denver Post’s inaugural April Heinrichs Award for the top senior girls soccer player, scholar and citizen in Colorado.
Denver North principal German Echevarría calls Gentry “a complete game-changer in how North athletics is viewed” amid a historic run for the Vikings’ girls soccer program.
With Gentry as a four-year varsity starter and two-year captain, Denver North made the playoffs every season. That included the Class 4A semifinals in Gentry’s sophomore season, winning the program’s first league title in her junior season as the program moved up classifications and returning to the postseason, again in Class 5A, this spring.
Over that span, the winger tallied 15 goals, five assists and 35 points in ’26 to finish her career with 34 goals, 32 assists and 100 points. She was the focus of every opponent’s scouting report since breaking out with 10 goals as a freshman in 2023, with teams often man-marking her for the entire match in an attempt to limit her effectiveness.
“She’s one of those players where when she gets a chance, she’s going to put it away, whether it’s a goal or with an amazing assist,” said Riverdale Ridge head coach Danelle Dondelinger, whose Ravens played Denver North each of the last three years. “The last two years in particular, she was a truly dominating factor on the field. And she truly is a beast that you have to honor (with a special game plan).”
From the ‘edge of quitting’
Gentry’s technical skill can be traced back over a decade to the backyard of her Highland home, where she and her older sister, Addison Gentry, would set up obstacle courses to dribble and juggle through. It was in those formative years that Lea developed one of her patented offensive moves: she pops the ball up over a defender’s head, then races around to get it in open space to create a chance.
“We would set up a goal at the end of the yard,” Addison Gentry recalled. “We’d put anything we could find out there in the way — chairs, tables, extra goals, other balls, hoses. It was crazy, fun stuff. And in those times I could tell soccer was going to be her lifelong passion.
“From a young age her footwork was insane and when we took that (over-the-head) move to games, opponents were wowed, because it’s not common to see people playing in the air that much.”
By the time Lea got to high school, it was quickly apparent she was going to be an all-timer at Denver North. But a rough sophomore year in which she lost confidence due to an untenable club situation and then missed a penalty kick in in the semifinals nearly derailed her career.
“I was on the edge of quitting,” Lea Gentry said. “But I found my love for the game again. I leaned back into it. And I knew (the missed PK) wasn’t something to dwell on or keep overanalyzing, but that it was something I could grow from.”
Since that moment, Porter saw Gentry’s “work rate, focus and drive all improve.”
“I saw a belief in her that I’m not sure she had before,” Porter said. “But she had arrived at the point where she realized she could lead the team. And so she did it. She embraced that standard and never shied away from it.”
Her teammates took notice. Chloe Thompson, Denver North’s goalie who has played with Gentry since elementary school, witnessed a relentless competitor who understands how greatness gets crafted in the practice beyond practice.
“We would work on shooting after practice, tons of extra shots, and she always had to end on a goal,” Thompson said. “There was one practice where she felt like she hadn’t done enough conditioning, so she ran more after practice.
“Another time this season, we were doing the Viking run, which is (a jogging/sprinting progression) around the field. She completed it with her group, then ran it again with the juniors and freshmen. I just laughed, like, ‘That was an insane workout, and you’re still going?!'”
An indelible impact
Gentry took that same insatiable approach in the classroom. Steve Wiant, who taught Gentry for four years in , says Gentry’s artistic side was another example of the well-rounded 17-year-old’s attention to detail.
For one project, Gentry combined penmanship samples from her family members to invent a unique font for a fictional restaurant’s branding. For another, she was a leader on the creation of an art installation in the Denver North front office that featured laser-cut symbols representing the school and its community. Gentry also won a congressional art contest for a digital illustration of Red Rocks Amphitheatre, and her creation was
Throughout all her successes, Wiant says Gentry stayed focused on her ultimate goal: college soccer. She ended up with 15 Division I offers before committing to Corvallis.
“She didn’t outwardly celebrate her academic success,” Wiant said. “And I had no idea about how good she was in flag football before I found out on social media. These were all just benchmarks to her, I think, because she’s been so driven and focused on her endgame. Even now, she knows she’s going to a very competitive environment at Oregon State, so she’s remained focused on bigger things down the road.”
When she heads off to join her college program in mid-July, Gentry will have left an indelible impact on the Northside community.
For the past 12 years, Gentry has volunteered with her family at the Saint Elizabeth soup-and-sandwich lines for the homeless. While a student at Denver North, she also helped coordinate a food and shelter relief project for Venezuelan migrants, assisted her father with a tiny-home project for the homeless, and volunteered at various soccer clinics, including one held recently at Valdez Elementary.
“I grew up with my mom saying things like, ‘Put yourself in other people’s shoes’ and ‘You never know what’s going on at home,'” Gentry said. “So I’ve always wanted to have that mindset, and I’ve always wanted to support those less fortunate than I am, because I already have all the support and everything I need. So if I have the opportunity to help someone else get that support, I’m always going to do it no matter what.”
Gentry beat out a field of 38 nominations to win the April Heinrichs Award, including four other worthy finalists in Fossil Ridge’s Reese Morgan (runner-up), Buena Vista’s Mae Blazer, Chatfield’s Tyler Sternberg and Frontier Academy’s Emily Gesick.
Denver North’s female athlete of the year was voted the winner by a 17-person selection committee that included high school coaches, former standout Colorado players, media members, and Heinrichs herself. Gentry was named on all but two of the ballots, and received 10 first- or second-place votes.
For winning, Gentry receives a $1,000 scholarship from the nonprofit that sponsors the award, the Colorado High School Girls Soccer Player Award Corporation. She will also receive a luncheon in her honor and be recognized at the match on July 3 against the Kansas City Current at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park.
“I’m kind of speechless to be honest, and I see winning this award as an incredible opportunity,” Gentry said. “I think many, many girls will look up to this award in the coming years, and having my name under it is phenomenal. I aspire to be a person that girls look up to, and it’s humbling what this award says about me as a player, in the classroom, in the community, and as a person overall. It’s a bar I want to live up to going forward.”
