UK Signee Maddyn Greenway Named 2025-26 MaxPreps Female National Athlete of the Year

She starred on the hardwood at point guard, excelled as a forward on the pitch and shined in both track and field disciplines.

A Kentucky basketball signee, the 5-foot-10 Greenway squeezed everything she could from her high school sports career.

She leaves Providence Academy as a 13-time state champion while owning the state scoring mark in both basketball and soccer. She also broke state marks in her final days as a prep athlete in the 300-meter hurdles and as the as the anchor leg of the 4×400 relay team.

Greenway has been named the 2025-26 MaxPreps Female National Athlete of the Year.

“I think that just the history of MaxPreps and all the great athletes that they’ve recognized in the past, it’s really cool,” Greenway said. “When I got the call of being National Athlete of the Year, I thought it was super awesome. Looking at the past list (of winners including) like Paige (Bueckers) and all of them who have done such great things. I didn’t realize how big of a deal it was until like I kind of sat back and looked at the other winners.

“I was honestly shocked to be recognized because those are girls that I’ve looked up to since I was young.”

The three-sport athlete and daughter of former NFL linebacker Chad Greenway takes her place on the stage alongside previous MaxPreps Female National Athlete of the Year winners likes Bueckers, Joyce Edwards, Olympians Missy Franklin and Alex Shackell, as well as Chiney and Nneka Ogwumike (see the complete list below).

Greenway owns the state basketball scoring mark at 5,621 points and is third all-time nationally in the history of the sport according to the MaxPreps National Record Book.

She also holds the state assist mark with 1,186 and the point guard ended her six-year career with more than 1,100 rebounds. She won gold while representing the United States and was a McDonald’s All American.

In soccer, Greenway holds the career and single-season state scoring mark with 218 and 62 goals, respectively.

She also capped her Providence Academy career Saturday shattering the 300 hurdle mark in 41.88 seconds and then anchoring the 4×400 relay team as it broke the state record in 3:51.48.

Arguably the most-decorated high school athlete in Minnesota history told MaxPreps it’s not the individual records that she is most proud of, but the titles.

“There is a chance the records will be broken, but the championships will remain,” she said in March after winning the Class AA basketball championship.

The run of state crowns includes five straight in basketball, two in a row in soccer and six in track and field.

Providence Academy girls basketball coach Conner Goetz has had a front-row seat for Greenway’s exploits and said her legacy will extend beyond the school’s courts and fields.

“I think in the next few years, Maddyn is going to be remembered for just the dominance she had on the court, on the soccer field, on the track,” Goetz said. “But I think in 10 years down the line, 20 years down the line, I think you’re going to see a legacy that she kind of built for the younger generation of girls, female athletes coming through that you don’t have to be one-sport athlete anymore.

Leaving a legacy, however, isn’t something you conjure from thin air or wish cast.

“The work consistently separates her,” Goetz said. “I’ve been around a lot of really high-level athletes and there’s something different (with her).”

He said she scored eight touchdowns in a powder puff game and could pick up a golf club and fire off a 200-yard drive.

A captain in all three sports since her sophomore year, Greenway said the competitive fire runs deep in her household. In addition to father Chad spending 10 season in the NFL, all with the hometown Vikings, her mom Jenni ran track at Iowa and coaches at Providence Academy. Her sister Beckett Greenway has been alongside Maddyn the past few seasons for the titles in basketball, soccer and track. Her youngest sisters Blakely (11) and Carsyn (9) could one day follow chase their older sister’s marks.

“There’s four sisters and we’re all super competitive,” Greenway said. “My mom is probably the most competitive though.”

From that spirit of competition, Greenway said she developed the winner’s mentality.

“I’m not always so high strung and so competitive, but the moment I step between the lines, I don’t have any friends and I want to just really go out and win,” she said. “A lot of people when they talk to me, they’re like, ‘Oh my gosh, you’re so much nicer than we expected.’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, well I’m not really nice on the court because I want to win.” But the moment I step off of it …”

Yet, she is also fiercely aware of fostering relationships among her teammates and embracing the leadership mantle — a role similar to being an older sister, she said.

“I hope my teammates would say I’m obviously a good leader and competitor. I think I really try and bring the best out of my teammates through practice and just really celebrating the little wins with the younger kids,” Greenway said. “I just really try to bring us all together and kind of be that really outgoing and fun captain.”

Greenway said her senior year was spent appreciating the journey of being a high school student, deepening teammate relationships and savoring the little things before heading to Kentucky this summer. Down time, she said, consists of hanging with a tight-knit circle of friends, going to the lake, reading and spending time with Beckett, Blakely and Carsyn.

“It can get kind of consuming if you just focus on athletics and all that,” Greenway said. “Me and my sisters are super close, so I’ve been trying to spend as much time as I can with them before I leave.”

Goetz said his point guard has found a way to balance the athletic pressure, need for down time and even the celebrity that comes with being one of the best basketball players in the country.

“With Maddyn there’s a lot more because she has a social media presence,” Goetz said. “She’s really well known and in fact some would probably even say she’s famous. So pressure and expectations come differently for her than any other kid. A lot of us get internal. A lot of us we go into a shell, but she embraces the pressure. She wants that moment to occur.

“We talk about the man in the arena or we talk about the cream rises to the top. Pressure creates diamonds and Maddyn became a diamond every single time.”

Past Winners
2007-08 — Nneka Ogwumike, Cy-Fair (Cypress, Texas)
2008-09 — Jordan Hasay, Mission College Prep (San Luis Obispo, Calif.)
2009-10 — Chiney Ogwumike, Cy-Fair
2010-11 — Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis, Mater Dei (Santa Ana, Calif.)
2011-12 — Missy Franklin, Regis Jesuit (Aurora, Colo.)
2012-13 — Missy Franklin, Regis Jesuit
2013-14 — Ariana Washington, Long Beach Poly (Long Beach, Calif.)
2015-16 — Mikayla Pivec, Lynnwood (Bothell, Wash.)
2016-17 — Tara Davis, Agoura (Calif.)
2017-18 — Alissa Pili, Dimond (Anchorage, Alaska)
2018-19 — Alissa Pili, Dimond
2019-20 — Paige Bueckers, Hopkins (Minnetonka, Minn.)
2020-21 — Paige Morningstar, North Allegheny (Wexford, Pa.)
2021-22 — Kiki Rice, Sidwell Friends (Washington, D.C.)
2022-23 — Joyce Edwards, Camden (S.C.)
2023-24 — Joyce Edwards, Camden
2024-25 — Alex Shackell, Carmel (Ind.)