Juliet Slater’s high level of competitiveness didn’t start when she first stepped onto the hardwood at Erie High School. If anything, the senior’s time with the Tigers only made her that much more of a beast.
Just ask her older brother, Owen, who helped instill that love of hoops by beating her.
“Our whole family is kind of super competitive,” Owen said. “She’s got three brothers, which I’m sure contributes to that, but we both competed heavily in basketball. … We were competitive in everything, like board games or video games or whatever. We played a ton of 1-v-1s and I helped her with her shooting. She helped me with shooting all the time. We’d do competitions on who could get the best shooting percentage. Shockingly, she was better at me at 3-pointers than I was.
“The funny thing about her is when she was younger and she used to play, she’d get so angry. She used to have this grimace, the ‘Juliet grimace,’ that my mom would always comment about. If you were playing a game or something, you could tell she was getting serious. If you look at all the pictures of her playing it, every single time she’s thrown into the basket, she looks terrifying.”
Erie’s Juliet Slater looks for a path to the basket around Rock Canyon’s Anna Spielmann during the Tigers’ home Class 6A state tournament game against Rock Canyon on Feb. 28, 2026. (Alissa Noe/BoCoPreps.com)
That monster, while nothing but smiles and positive energy outside of competition, helped lead the Tigers to a 20-5 record and a trip to the Class 6A Sweet 16. They beat No. 23 Rock Canyon 53-30 on their home court in the second round after receiving a bye in the first.
Slater ended her final high school campaign with 14.6 points per game, 4.1 rebounds per game and 3.6 steals per game, earning her the Times-Call player of the year.
Her head coach, Tyler Cerveny, has been with her since her freshman year, when he first took over the program.
“As she’s grown, she’s accepted kind of being the alpha option and has embraced it,” Cerveny said. “She faces the best defender on the other team every game. Back in the day, it might have bothered her a little bit, but she’s just taken on any challenge that they throw at her. Her level of skill is unbelievable.
“Everybody talks about scoring and that kind of thing, but as a coach, if there’s a loose ball late or rebound late and she’s in the vicinity, I know she’s going to get it. The anxiety goes down. She’s just that great of a competitor. I’ve seen her for four years. I don’t know — there are just so many good things to say.”
It wasn’t always that way, however.
When Juliet first began playing basketball in second grade, just for fun, she said she hated it. She wanted to quit, but as soon as Owen defeated her in a competition, she decided to lock in so she could become better than he was.
“I think (I hated) the physicality, which is kind of funny because now I’d say I’m a very physical and aggressive player. I think I fouled out every game. I ran under a chair and cried,” Juliet recalled. “He beat me in this all-star game and so he got to go play at the Nuggets stadium and I didn’t. I had to go watch it. I think that was just the competitiveness where it’s like, ‘I want to beat him so bad, so I’m going to be good at this.’”
Erie’s Juliet Slater, center, shoots between Skyline’s Lauren Pratt, left, and Breanne Baker, right, on Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025. (Matthew Jonas/Staff Photographer)
She joined a club in fourth grade and took off from there, and all the while, she and Owen would push each other to their limits.
“It definitely made me better in the long run,” Juliet said. “He always encouraged me, even when I had struggles with my confidence, I guess. He always was just like, ‘Get back in the gym. You’ll be good,’ and encouraging me, for the most part.”
During her freshman year at Erie, when she started frustrating the seniors with her aggressiveness and ability, she realized she had a real future in the sport. Now that her career with the Tigers has wrapped up, she’ll head to West Texas A&M to join its program.
Owen said he has an excuse now to drive down to Texas, get some barbecue, and watch his little sister continue to impress on the court. But no matter what happens from here on out, she’s left an indelible mark on Erie’s program.
“It was amazing, even playing Rock Canyon, where we got smoked by them my sophomore year to kind of get our (payback),” she said. “It had always been our goal to host a game and win a playoff game. That was really big.”