Luke Zuffelato is a sophomore at Santa Barbara High School and is February’s Athlete of The Month. In late 2022, Luke was awarded the Athletic Round Table’s Athlete of the Week award for his accomplishments in the early basketball season. As co-captain, He would regularly score 20 or more points per game and has a career high of 40 points in one game, which Zuffelato calls a “very memorable moment for me and the team.”

Zuffelato also plays volleyball, and while he only started indoor volleyball last year, he has enjoyed beach volleyball his entire life. Zuffelato has claimed to have played basketball since he was a little kid but fully got into the sport by third grade. He looks up to his idol, the late Kobe Bryant, as inspiration because of “his mentality and [his] willingness to sacrifice so much in order to be the best as possible.” Beating records was a goal Bryant hoped to accomplish that Zuffelato shares, “A goal of mine is to break the three point and scoring record at our school, and I’m already placed second in the three point record and 6th in scoring record, so I think I will for sure be able to beat the records by the end of my high school career.”

When asked what his career highlight was so far, Zuffelato responded, “Personally my whole sophomore year has been a highlight, but as a team, my freshman year when Devan Stone hit the game winner against Dos Pueblos High School was a very memorable moment for me and the team.” 

Looking into the future, Zuffelato hopes to pursue basketball well beyond his high school career. “It’s the thing I enjoy the most, and I want to spend the rest of my life playing this sport.” This basketball season, Zuffelato looks forward to CIF and states that “these next couple of years we have a legit shot to win the whole thing.”

Zuffelato (while only having two years under his belt) has had a very promising and successful career thus far. All signs point to him succeeding in his journey to be one of the best athletes SBHS has seen. Zuffelato wants to shout out his dad for being supportive and pushing him to be the person he is today. 

Zuffelato practicing before a big away game against Dos Pueblos. [Image Credit: James Sanchez]