Andie Shelton is one of the best talents to ever come out of the area. After being named an All-American last week, Ripon Christian’s senior setter reached another milestone Thursday afternoon and signed her National Letter of Intent. She chose to continue her career at the University of Pacific next year and passed up on multiple other offers.

Shelton, a two-time Sac-Joaquin Section Division V champion and a one-time AAU national champ, is currently ranked by PrepVolleyball.com as one of the top-five setters in the Class of 2014 nationally.

She opted for UOP over several other full-ride offers. Shelton even visited UC Santa Barbara and Pepperdine before making the stop to Stockton.

“I thought there was no way I’d like UOP after I just visited these two beautiful schools in Southern California, but I fell in love with it,” said Shelton, who verbally committed with the Tigers in March. “I fell in love with the campus. I loved the coaches and I loved the team. I’m a really big homebody and I’m really close to my family. It just seemed perfect for me.”

Shelton passed on UC San Diego and Pac-12 schools like Southern California and Washington State in order to stay closer to home.

Even though home is within the same city limits as campus, she’s still going to be a resident while getting to take in the entire college experience.

And there are benefits with that, too.

“I get to go home whenever I want,” she said. “If I need to do my laundry, I can go home. If I feel overwhelmed, I can run to my parents and talk to them. Going to college is a tough change, so it’s going to be nice to have my family there to support me.”

Last summer, Shelton went to Croatia and made the first team all-tournament team at the Global Challenge. When she was a 15-year old, she was named an All-American at the AAU nationals.

She has currently helped her team into the Sac-Joaquin Section Division IV postseason for a second straight year after winning the title at the Division V level in 2010 and ’11.

During her freshman year at RC, Shelton not only helped the Knights win a section championship but was a first-team all-leaguer as well. She was also on the prep volleyball top 50 list her freshman and sophomore seasons.

Shelton is currently on the senior aces list, a list of the top seniors in the nation. She has one more season of competitive travel ball with the Delta Volleyball Club left before she starts suiting up in a Tiger uniform full time. Shelton has been playing with Delta since she was 12.

UOP recruited Shelton to be its setter, even though she enjoys every opportunity she gets to elevate over the net and play outside hitter at the high school level.

“I’m definitely going to UOP as a setter,” Shelton concluded. “I do love hitting. That’s why I love high school because I get the opportunity to hit. But setting is what they recruited me for. That’s my job.”