Miami Palmetto’s Ava Alvarez is the Miami-Dade Flag Football Player of the Year

Winning Miami-Dade County’s first ever flag football state title was a true group effort for Palmetto.

But Ava Alvarez, as the quarterback, was in the middle of everything the Panthers did on their way to their historic championship.

After guiding Palmetto into the history books, Alvarez is the Miami Herald’s Miami-Dade County Flag Football Player of the Year.

Alvarez was one of the best dual-threat quarterbacks in the state, throwing for more than 2,600 yards and rushing for more than 600, while accounting for nearly 60 touchdowns for one of the best teams in Florida, and Alvarez did it without a single receiver racking up more than 700 yards.

The Panthers won with balance. And Alvarez made Palmetto’s balance possible.

The junior went 284 of 476 for 2,656 yards, 49 touchdowns and only eight interceptions, and added 610 yards and 10 more touchdowns on 100 carries. Alvarez not only led the team in passing yards, but her 610 rushing yards were more than any Panther had receiving or rushing yards and her 629 yards from scrimmage — she also caught four passes for 19 yards — were the third most on the team.

Palmetto lost just one game — by one point to perennial powerhouse Edison — and won their first six postseason games by 112 points to reach the final four, where they beat Pace in the Class 2A semifinals and then stunned Ruskin Lennard, 26-25, in the title game by scoring a game-winning touchdown with just four seconds left.

“It was very surreal and how it ended was crazy even though we all were very confident of how it was going to end,” Alvarez said. “When you go to a big game like this and win the way you win, it’s all worth it.”

Although the touchdown-scoring hero in the title game was athlete Serenity Simon, Alvarez went 23 of 34 for 207 yards and two touchdowns in the championship.

For the their balanced approach and multi-quarterback philosophy to work, the Panthers needed someone unselfish in the middle and Alvarez gave them just the leader they needed to make history.