The Coronado High School Football Team showed they are the masters of Canadian football rules, when they defeated Bishop Carroll High School in Calgary, Alberta, Canada Friday night by the score of 50-3.

The Islanders reached the rather unusual point total by scoring seven touchdowns, successfully completing seven extra point kicking conversions, and added a ‘rouge’ or a ‘single’ as it is now called north of the border. Islander tailback and place kicker Kelcey Fisher accounted for two of the touchdowns, all of the extra points and the rouge. The latter is a point awarded when a kickoff cannot be returned from the 20-yard end zone used in Canadian football. As a point of reference, a 10-yard end zone is used in American football.

"That was a great kick," said Head Coach Bud Mayfield of Fisher’s boot. "He kicked off out the back of the end zone. With the bounces, it was a 100-yard kick."

Mayfield re-capped the Islanders trip north. "They (Bishop Carroll) weren’t up to it this year. They played hard and were scrappy, but they were intimidated by us. Everybody played and played a lot for us. We played everybody that went on the trip. Our defensive line dominated the game. They tried to run and couldn’t on our defensive front."

When asked if anyone stood out defensively, Mayfield said, "No, it was one of those big group things, like ‘stopped by the center of the Coronado line.’ It was a good game for them (the defense). Fisher had a good game and played most of the way on defense. He did a great job on the kicking game."

The balance of the Coronado scoring came on an 11-yard gallop by Ricardo Oberwager, an Eddie Gomez four-yard run, a 69-yard touchdown pass from David Loving to Jimmy Gersonde, a 2-yard touchdown run by Loving, and a 4-yard score by Curtis Perkins.

Apart from the game, the Canada trip is an opportunity for the team members to broaden their personal horizons, with Mayfield and the Islander coaching staff serving as the tour guides. "The whole trip was a huge success," said Mayfield. "We went to Banff and to Lake Louise, which was really gorgeous. We spent two hours talking at the Olympic Training Center with the lugers and bobsledders. The weather was cool, but it was nice. There was deep snow in the Canadian Rockies."

The team also went to the Western Hockey League game between the Calgary Hitmen and the Lethbridge Hurricanes, which the home team won 1-0 in an overtime shootout. Loving and the starting quarterback from Bishop Carroll slid frozen turkeys to the middle of the hockey rink, with Loving losing the competition by a foot. "Our guys went crazy of course," Mayfield said. "We really had a lot of fun."

This week the Central League title chase begins in earnest, as the Islanders host the Clairemont Chieftains Friday night at 7:30 pm. The remaining five regular season games are all conference contests, with Coronado having the advantage of hosting three of the games at Niedermeyer Field. Clairemont enters the game coming off of a 28-11 loss to Serra last week. Coronado’s other Central League games in order are: at Crawford, home with Kearney, at University City and the final regular season game is at home with Madison.

"It’s going to be a toss-up," Mayfield said of the conference race. "Every week in the Central League, the team that makes the fewest mistakes will win. Nobody is the top dog. We need to get up for five straight weeks. We have a lot of enthusiasm right now and no injuries. Those things count."

Congratulations to Islander senior football player Kyle McArthur, who was the subject of a "Player Profile" in last Friday’s "San Diego Union-Tribune." Showing the smarts (3.86 GPA) that he hopes will get him into either the Coast Guard Academy or the Naval Academy, the 5-foot, 10-inch, 190-pound lineman listed Head Football Coach Bud Mayfield’s AP English Literature class as his favorite.

McArthur is having a fine season on the gridiron and is also a standout in lacrosse.

CHS Cross Country Head Coach George Green provides an overview of last week’s events. "We thought after the Saints Small School Invitational that based on their results Clairemont wouldn’t be a threat in the Central League championship. We knew they had two very good front runners, but Coronado had the depth. What we didn’t know (but feared might be the case) is they had another runner who wasn’t at the Saints meet.

Last Friday’s dual meet with Clairemont will probably turn out to be the deciding match for this year’s title, as there appears to be no other teams in the league with either the front runners or the depth to compete.

Ben Enowitz and the Chieftain’s top two runners Bernardo Bahena and Daniel Crotty, changed leads throughout the 3-mile Morley Field City Conference cross country course all the way to the finish line, where Bahena won by 6 inches over teammate Crotty, with Enowitz only 2 inches back. All three runners were clocked in 17:07.

The Islanders Michael Davies placed fourth in 17:49, followed by David Grimes, Andrew Falkiewicz and Jack Harms in the sixth, seventh and eighth places respectively. The previously unknown Clairemont runner placed fifth.

Harms closed from ninth to eighth place in the last 300 yards to overtake a Clairemont runner, a move that gave the Islanders a two-point swing and proved to be one of the crucial moves of the race. Cross country is scored by adding the finishing places of the Top 5 finishers from each team, with the lowest score winning. When Harms crossed the finish line, Coronado had 28 points for their first five runners, compared to Clairemont’s 17 points for their first four runners. Had Clairemont been able to place their fifth runner in the 10^th position, they would have won 27-28.

Another element of cross country scoring is that a team consists of seven runners. The sixth and seventh finishers from a team aren’t scored, but they take up spots in the order of finish, to push back the score of the other team; hence the term ‘pushers.’ Cotter Stacy and Jose Tijerina finished in the 10^th and 11^th slots, and pushed Clairemont’s score back to 29 points after their fifth runner finished in 12^th place.

The final score was 28-29 in favor of the Islanders. Also competing, but not scoring for Coronado were Ben Green, Jack McMahon and Ross Palmer.

The Girls match-up was much less dramatic, as Clairemont failed to field a full team and forfeited the match 15-50. Way out in front was Clairemont’s Division III defending champion Bridie McCarey, who finished with a time of 18:52 over the same three-mile course run by the boys. Coronado’s Marissa Nagler came in third place in 23:21, followed by Karolin Ivarsson (4^th in 23:25), Anneke Nelson (5^th), Sheila Braun (6^th), Sammie Runyon (7^th), Allison Cabana (8^th), Sarah Player (11^th), Helen Luppi (12^th) and Brigid Twomey (13^th).

Two days later at the "Dare to Soar the Bridge" 8K run (4.97 miles), David Grimes averaged 5:50 per mile to place fourth overall in 29:02, out of over 800 runners. Not too shabby."

There were games aplenty played last week by the CHS Girls Volleyball Team. Thursday they played Horizon and lost 23-25, 25-18, 25-17, and 25-21. "We lost a tough match," said Head Coach Phil Trotter. "It kind of took the wind out of our sails for the Friday match (against Marian Catholic). We went in thinking we should win the match. We didn’t play well as a team and it took us a little while to get our confidence back."

The game against Marian Catholic was the first game in pool play of the Beach Cities Tournament. After running out to a 6-0 and then to a 10-3 lead in game one, Coronado let the Crusaders back into the match, yielding 11 of the next 13 points. A combination of good serving by Kelsey Fitzgerald, a Dusty Dvorak-style (1980’s USA Olympic volleyball reference) hook kill shot by setter Megan Mushovic, and consistent serving by Emmy Pickett righted the Islander ship and Coronado held on to win 25-23.

Game two was close until Fitzgerald had four kill shots in the next eight points and Kelly Phelps served for three straight points for Coronado. A Phelps kill shot closed out the second game for Coronado, earning them the 25-21 victory.

Coronado also faced California’s defending Division II state champion Archbishop Mitty in pool play. The Monarchs are led by 6-foot, 5-inch sophomore Amanda Gil, and they were the eventual tournament champions. Trotter offered his perspective on the game. "We played them great. We knew we were going to have our hands full, but we were totally loose and didn’t have any real worries. It was 18-18 in the first game and they called time out. My goal as a coach is to get them to call timeouts. That shows we’re doing our job. The play from our middleblockers Caitlin Kennedy and Kelsey Fitzgerald improved dramatically over the weekend. I get the feeling we’re about to turn the corner."

Coronado concluded the tournament with a 25-20, 15-25, and 15-10 loss to Venice High School. "We lost to Venice in the semi-finals of the Bronze Division," Trotter added. "We have plenty of season left and there are plenty of things to be encouraged about. When we play together and as a team we play with confidence, we can play with anybody. We still have to learn to play to win and not to play to lose."

This week the team plays at San Diego Monday, hosts Patrick Henry Wednesday, and concludes the week at Morse on Friday. All three games are Eastern League contests.

The Boys Water Polo Team’s schedule was hectic as well, starting the week last Wednesday with a 15-5 pasting of University City. Sean Castillo and Preston Lujan scored four goals each. Joe Moffit added two tallies, and single goals were scored by Eric Clapper, Jacob Smith, Daniel Pedrotty, John Landon and Alex Ratcliffe. Smith also added a game-high five assists.

The problem with playing in a strong, multi-team tournament like the S&R Cup Invitational Tournament in Irvine is that if you lose your first game, you can finish no higher than ninth place, which is exactly what happened to Coronado. Facing Jesuit High School from Sacramento in their first tournament game Friday, the Islanders came out on the short end of the 13-11 final score. The loss relegated Coronado to the Consolation bracket. Later that evening Coronado defeated Irvine High School 20-3.

Saturday Coronado met Corona del Mar in the early game and defeated the No. 6 ranked team in Orange County 14-9. The Islanders then faced the No. 4 ranked team from the O.C., Los Alamitos in the consolation final and won 14-13. Coronado posted a 3-1 record in tournament play.

"I would have preferred going 1-3 and being in a tougher bracket," said Islander Head Coach Randy Burgess. "After the disappointing loss Friday and the win over Irvine, I felt good about the win over CDM. We came back and played a really great game and controlled the game early. It may have been our best game (this season) in terms of coming out and being ready to play. I’m hoping for a game soon when we have five or six guys in synch. We’re getting close to that. I’m excited that we’re starting to look good as a team."

Burgess discussed the individual contributions of his team. "Sean Castillo was at the top of his game and playing as well as anybody throughout the tournament. Sean may have been the standout. Jesse Farquhar is getting healthy again. He had five goals in the Los Al game. Preston Lujan played well and Devin Farrell had a really nice overall game against Los Al, doing some good things. In the Irvine game, Kyle Pokorny had five saves and did a real nice job. Patrick Queisser had a good tournament and had some key saves when they started coming back. In the second quarter we let Pat get into some bad situations defensively and he bailed us out. His passing was excellent. Eric Clapper continues to be our most consistent player. Against Los Alamitos he took their center forward and did a great job of getting him out of synch."

This week the Islanders enjoy a rare off week, with no games scheduled. "This gives a chance to rehab and recover," Burgess noted. "Clapper is a little dinged up and Farquhar and Smith are both rehabbing their injuries. It will be good to have some time off. Then we’ll pick up the pace again."

Alexcie Sanchez continues to lead the Coronado Girls Golf Team on and off the links. Last week, the Islanders defeated Point Loma at the Balboa Golf Course 264-270 and Sanchez was the medalist for Coronado, shooting a 40.

According to Head Coach Hanna Cohan, the match presented a rules challenge for the players of both teams. "It was an interesting one in regard to a rules clarification that came up. It was a lesson for everybody that we need to know our rules. We can never assume. When in doubt, play two balls."

In the week’s other match, Sanchez was again the leading scorer for Coronado with a 38, but the Islanders fell to La Jolla 236-256 at Coronado Municipal.

Coach Cohan knows how to address the rules questions. "We’re going to include a section on rules at our practice Monday. Alexcie is going to be our rules aficionada. We’ll hand the podium over to her."

This week the Islanders play Scripps Ranch Tuesday at the Double Tree Country Club and Thursday they face a very tough Cathedral Catholic team at Riverwalk CC.

Head Coach Robbin Adair supplies a report on his Girls Tennis squad. "Monday we lost to OLP 17-1, with Spencer Berman and Jen Carney getting our only point. Hayley Kitzmiller and Amanda Purvis were both out because of illness and injury.

Wednesday we traveled out to El Capitan and lost 10-8. We were still short-handed, but Allie Gordon managed to win two sets and defeated their No. 2 player 6-0. In doubles Berman and Carney kept it close by sweeping all three of their sets, while Kitzmiller and Alicia Ruiz won one set.

Thursday we hosted La Jolla and we got beat 15-3, but we played our best match of the week. Nicole Aponte and Gordon both managed to win a set in singles, and Berman/Carney won a set before falling in a tie breaker. All the sets were well-contested against really fine opponents.

So at this juncture, we have completed the first round of league play. This week we play a non-league match with Otay Ranch Monday and then start the second round of play in the Western League at Cathedral Catholic Tuesday. We finish the week with a league match at University City Friday at 2 pm."

It was a good week to be a CHS grad, as several former Islander stars were in the news. University of Nebraska freshman soccer goalkeeper Jamie Klages (CHS ’05) was named Big 12 Conference Defensive Player of the Week after earning shutouts in the Cornhusker’s two games. The games included a 0-0 double overtime tie against Kansas and a 3-0 victory over Missouri. Through games of last week, Klages had allowed only one goal in 290 minutes of Big 12 Conference competition.

Tailback J.T. Rogan (CHS ’04) helped lead his Torero football team to a 5-1 record as USD defeated Butler 49-7 Saturday. Rogan rushed for 117 yards on 19 carries and scored two touchdowns. He now has 497 rushing yards and 100 receiving yards on the season and is averaging 4.78 yards per carry.

Friday night on the campus of UCSD, four CHS water polo alums took to the Canyonview Pool in a game between Princeton and the home-standing Tritons. UCSD All-American Jonathan Hopkins (CHS ’01) scored three goals and helped lead UCSD to a 12-7 victory. Princeton’s Jamal Motlagh (CHS ’02) scored two goals. The anticipated match-up between the two at the center forward position didn’t materialize, as both were in foul trouble throughout the game. Scott Syverson (CHS ’04) and Gant Morgner (CHS ’02) shared the goal-tending duties for Princeton.