Much like Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s ‘girl with the curl right in the middle of her forehead,’ when Coronado’s Varsity Football Team is good, they are very good indeed, but when they are bad they are horrid. Friday night at Madison High School, ‘the very good indeed’ version of the Islanders took the field against their arch rivals and spanked the Warhawks 33-13 to create three-way tie atop the Central League standings with one regular season game remaining. Coronado, Madison and Thursday evening’s Islander Homecoming opponent University City are all knotted at 3-1. Coming into the game, the smart money would have been bet on Madison, as Coronado had a lengthy list of injuries. Senior Co-Captain JJ Pontes is out for the season with a broken ankle; starting tailback Ricardo Oberwager, who has rushed for 960 yards this year was out with a right shoulder sprain; and starting quarterback Stephen Conrad was placed on the limited duty list, suffering from the after affects of a bruised sternum. But the Islanders were more than up for the challenge. "It was a great win for them, coming off of the disappointment of the week before," said Head Coach Bud Mayfield of his team’s victory. "The kids were enthusiastic and the staff did a great job preparing them. We totally enjoyed knocking their (Madison’s) lights out. Our purpose was to go after them. We weren’t interested in throwing the ball down the middle of the field. Our goal was to knock them back and to dominate them. I’m very happy. The good kids whipped the schoolyard bully for a change."In the Coronado vs. Madison game story in the Nov. 4 edition of "The San Diego Union-Tribune," you might have been lead to believe that the Coronado victory was a fluke. In fact, Coronado was up 19-0 before the Football Gods started smiling. Their first scoring drive took 16 plays, while the second took 12 plays and ran five minutes off of the clock.Summarizing the contest as ‘The Kyle Brown Show,’ would the journalistically easy approach, as Coronado’s combo tailback and defensive back had a monster game. In addition to rushing for 260 yards from scrimmage, and pausing to rest briefly in the end zone on two of those carries; he snared a 23-yard touchdown pass from quarterback Mason Mills; blocked an extra point as a member of the special teams squad; and on the defensive side of the ball, was credited with a pass interception and an ensuing 68-yard return.En route to his 260 yards on the ground, Brown rushed 28 times, with nine of the carries yielding double digit gains. Only one of the 5-foot, 10-inch, and 170-pound junior’s carries was for minus yardage. The Islander offensive line deserves a lot of credit for Brown’s success. A large dose of Brown’s success is due to innate talent. Mayfield describes Brown, who transferred to Coronado this year from Northern California, as "the fastest tailback we’ve ever had." When you consider Mayfield is in his 19^th season at the helm of the Islander program, he’s seen a lot of runners tote the oblong leather ball for Coronado. The highlight of Brown’s resume was the 84-yard gallop at the mid-point of the second quarter. The ‘Big Uglies’ on the offensive line created a battle ship-sized hole in the Madison front four and Brown zipped through the Warhawk linebacker corps in a flash and then sped past the secondary in a sprint to the end zone. Speed advantage to Brown. Touchdown Coronado. Lineman Ben Thorne had another monster game, dominating the offensive and defensive line for Coronado. On defense, he was credited with a quarterback sack for minus 17 yards in the latter stages of the first half. With the game in the final minutes of play, Thorne did his ‘strip the ball and recover the fumble’ act for the third time this year. "Ben had a terrific game," said Mayfield of his senior co-captain. "He played very well on defense. We know he can overpower somebody as a blocking guard. He was also playing sideline to sideline making tackles. He had his best game of the year. The offensive line as a whole was sustaining their blocks. That’s how Kyle got a lot of extra yards." For the game, the Islander offense accounted for 368 yards from the line of scrimmage and scored five touchdowns. Mills connected on five of nine pass attempts, good for 81 yards and three touchdowns. The Football Gods assisted Coronado on one touchdown. The play in question was a 31-yard completion to Keith Englehart, who made a nice catch on the pass and then fumbled the ball into the end zone. Englehart had the presence of mind to fall on his own fumble for the touchdown. Technically, it’s a long pass, a fumble and a recovered fumble, but in the words of the late Hall of Fame Coach Hank Stram, Mills and Englehart "helped matriculate the ball down the field."

Due to the observance of Veterans’ Day Nov. 10, the annual homecoming game will be held Thursday, Nov. 9 this year. The Central League title and positioning for the CIF Division IV Playoffs will hinge on the outcome of the University City at Coronado game. Kick-off is slated for 7:30 pm.

Head Coach George Green checks in with the good news from the CHS Cross Country Program. "Both the Boys and Girls Cross Country Teams finished the dual meet portion of the season undefeated by besting Crawford and Madison last Thursday in the final dual meets of the season. The races were run as double duals, with all three schools running at the same time, but with the scoring computed individually. The CHS Boys placed their entire varsity team (the first seven runners) plus one JV runner in front of both the Colts and the Warhawks first finisher to win by the perfect score of 15-50. So dominant were the Islanders, that the Coronado JV would have won both meets also. Based on their season records, the lopsided wins were expected, so our three front runners Ben Enowitz, Michael Davies and David Grimes, used the race to pull the rest of the varsity squad to personal best times. Running as a group for most of the way, our Top Eight all finished in less than 19 minutes over the 3-mile Morley Field course. Ben, Michael and David crossed the finish line together in 18:13, followed by Jose Tijerina (18:14), Cotter Stacy (18:28), Ben Green (18:32), Turner Stanley (18:38), and Kevin Siefert (18:42). Kramer De Laurentis was 11^th (19:22) followed by Jordan Vance, Danny Luiken, Lucas Hemp, Jack Nolan, Micah Fishcer, Alex Fish, Frankie Harrison and Tim Sebring. The Girls race against Madison wasn’t expected to be a lock because of their depth. To counter this, our top two girls Sallie Privett and Adrianna Davies, who are also the Central League’s top two runners, paced our third runner Coco O’Brien around the course in an attempt to lock the race up front. In a cross country dual meet, a 1-2-3 finish ensures you’ll win the race. With 300 meters to go, it was obvious that this ploy worked, so the girls sprinted to the finish, with Privett winning in a time of 20:58. Davies was second in 21:10 and O’Brien third in 21:37 over the same 3-mile course run by the boys. The next three girls were from Madison. Sheila Braun was seventh, followed by Lindsay Pettee (11^th), Helen Luppi (15^th), Sarah Player (16^th) and Brigid Twomey (18^th). The Islanders won by the score of 23-32 against Madison and 16-45 against Crawford. Both the Boys and the Girls teams finished 4-0 for the season and are the Central League champions. Their next meet is the league individual championships next Thursday at 3 pm at Morley Field, followed by the CIF Finals for the varsity squad Nov. 18^th, also at Morley Field. The top two teams in each division plus the top individual runners qualify from this meet to run in the state championships in Fresno Nov. 25^th.

You can follow the Islander Cross Country team on our website at www.Islandertrack.com. I’ve just uploaded hundreds of photos from several of our meets."

Sign-ups for the Coronado Middle School winter sports season will be held Wednesday, November 8 at 6:30 pm. The event will be held at Granzier Hall at CMS.Winter sports offerings include boys basketball, boys and girls soccer, girls softball, and co-ed golf. The sign-up fee is $90 per child, per sport. The middle school sports program is administered by the Islander Sports Foundation. Although there is a fee associated with participation in the athletic program, ISF/CMS Sports has never denied a child the ability to compete at the middle school level. Scholarships are granted to families who request them.

Students must have a current physical exam, administered by a doctor, to be eligible to participate in sports sponsored by ISF/CMS. All pertinent ISF/CMS athletic forms (there are a total of four forms, some containing more than one page) may be downloaded from www.IslanderSportsFoundation.com.

With an 11-8 victory over Cathedral Catholic Wednesday and a 7-6 road victory at Foothill of Tustin Saturday, the Coronado Islanders improved their regular season record to 19-8 and emerged as tri-champions of the Western League. Coronado and Bishops have dominated league and CIF Division II play for many years, while this season marked the emergence of La Jolla as a possible title contender. All three teams were 1-1 against each other and finished the Western League campaign with identical 8-2 marks. In no particular order, the three teams should hold the Top 3 seeds in Division II. "Generally it was a pretty balanced attack," said Head Coach Randy Burgess of the Cathedral Catholic (formerly University of San Diego High School) contest. "It was a good way to conclude the league season. We’re starting to get back on track in our team play. We’re trying to get everybody back in place before the playoffs."Center forward Alex Johnson is still on the injured list, but Coronado now has the services of goalie Kyle Pokorny, who has returned after an illness. This allows fill-in goalie Jackson Crow-Mickle to again play in the field. Against Cathedral, Sean Cook scored four times, Jacob Smith and Eric Clapper scoring three goals each, and Adam Ratcliffe scored once for Coronado. The Foothill game Saturday saw Crow-Mickle in the field with a goal, two assists and a couple of steals; Cook had two goals and four steals; Smith earned four goals; and Pokorny was credited with nine saves. "At Tustin, the kids played loose and played well," Burgess said. "We’re looking fairly healthy as we start getting back into the flow of things."Via a series of coin flips, Coronado was designated as the Western League champion for playoff seeding purposes. The consequence of that victory is that Coronado will not face the possibility of having to travel to play at the home of a lower-seeded, lesser league champion in the early rounds. From a practical perspective, Coronado would be heavily favored to win a first round playoff game played on Mars with their JV squad, but home pool advantage is still nice to have.

The Islanders will play this Wednesday at 5 pm at the Coronado Aquatics Center against a playoff opponent to be announced. Saturday the 11^th is the date of the quarter-finals, the semi-finals are Tuesday the 14th, and the finals are Saturday the 18^th at the La Jolla Coggan Family Pool.

The long arm of the Coronado Water Polo program extended to Rio de Janeiro over the weekend as the U.S. Men’s’ National Team defeated Canada 7-6 for the 2006 ASUA Cup gold medal. Coronado’s Thomas Hopkins led all scorers with three goals and former Islander Layne Beaubien added two goals for the United States team.

The victory allows the U.S. to be the first qualifier out of the Americas for the World Championships.

Coronado’s Varsity Girls Volleyball Team played Eastern League champion Our Lady of Peace on the road on Halloween and took the Pilots to four games before falling 20-25, 25-23, 25-18, and 25-9. Islander Head Coach Christina Lahr, who used to coach in the OLP program, knew her opponent well. "They are a solid team. I told our girls to go out there, have a good time, and work hard. All I’m asking you to do is leave everything on the court. They worked hard through the whole match, until the last point. Other than the fourth game, we played a very good match."Armed with a victory over Division I CIF playoff entry Patrick Henry earlier in the season; and a 12-17 overall record, which included a 5-7 record against good competition in the Eastern League; the Islanders emerged with the No. 7 seed in the Division IV playoffs. Coronado will host Marian Catholic Tuesday evening at 7 pm. Should the Islanders advance, they will play at Bishop’s Thursday evening at either 6 pm or 7 pm.

Regarding the Marian Catholic game, Lahr said, "If we stay fired up and spirited through the whole match, I think we’ll be competitive."

Coronado was on the bubble for playoff consideration this year in Girls Golf and unfortunately they were touched out by La Jolla for the final team playoff slot. Alexcie Sanchez and Giovanna Ascolani qualified for the CIF Individual play, a result which was based on their regular season scoring differential. They were also the only two Coronado golfers to advance to the second round of the City Conference Tournament last week at River Walk. This week they play 18 holes Tuesday at Warner Springs. If they advance, they play another 18 holes at the Admiral Baker Course.

"It was an interesting season," said Head Coach Hanna Cohan. "They took the Top 5 low scoring differentials per team. If they took the Top 6, we had a better overall score than La Jolla. But in the Top 5 scores, the edge went to La Jolla. We were close and I thought we had made it. It was weird how it worked out."

After barely finishing out of the running in their quest to make the CIF Division II Team Playoffs, Coronado starts play in the Western League Individual playoffs Monday at Morley Field. All 15 CHS squad members are entered, according to Head Coach Robbin Adair. The results of the Western Conference tournament will help determine who will qualify for CIF individual play next week.