Nado Natterings
A weekly column by David Axelson

Nado Natterings
by David Axelson, Chief Executive Officer
The Islander Sports Foundation

4 April 2007 Issue #13

Last week The Coronado’s Girls Lacrosse Team added three more victories to their record, which now stands at 8-0. Their ‘victims’ included Patrick Henry by the score of 18-5, Cathedral Catholic 16-6 and most importantly, they defeated City Conference rival La Jolla Friday night by the score of 10-8.

Organized differently than most CIF sports, lacrosse has one division for all member schools. Coronado, with roughly 1,000 students, competes in the same division as Poway and La Costa Canyon, two schools which each have roughly three times the number of students enrolled at CHS.

In the 2006 playoffs, the last four teams standing were Coronado, La Jolla, La Costa Canyon and eventual CIF champion Poway. Scores from the beginning of the 2007 season would seem to indicate that those four teams will be in the title chase again. “Poway is the No. 1 team in the county,” said CHS Head Coach Jessica Battle. “They didn’t graduate one player. They are beatable, definitely, but they will be a hard team to beat.”

Before taking on the North County schools later this month, Coronado had to face a challenge from La Jolla Friday night. Battle, who typically doesn’t include games from early-season tournaments in her club’s won-loss record, had faced La Jolla already this year and had lost by a pair of goals. The Vikings and the Islanders perennially are the class of girls lacrosse in the South County.

“It was good to see La Jolla play in the tournament,” Battle said. “I felt better going into the game Friday night having seen them and knowing what they are all about.” Even with advanced knowledge of a capable opponent, the Islanders fell behind by three goals in the early going, but then ran off six straight tallies to take command of the game. “That’s a pretty good testament to the team to be behind like that, keep our heads in it and come back and win.”

Accounting for the Islander scoring were Greer Goebels with four goals, Hannah Sebenaler added three goals and two assists; Bria Phillips had two goals and two assists and Coco O’Brien chipped in with a goal and an assist. Goalie Alyssa Littin was credited with 10 saves.

“Jena Harrison played a great game at third man,” said Battle, giving the team’s defense some well-deserved recognition. “At defensive wing, Sandy Shepherd and Kelsey Branch both played great. I have a great team this year.”

The challenge for Battle from a scheduling perspective is to complete her City Conference schedule, while also making sure her team plays the potent North County competition they will see in the final playoff rounds. April 16 the Islanders play at La Costa Canyon; April 28 they are at Torrey Pines; and April 30 Coronado travels to Poway. Notice all three games are on the road as is the La Jolla re-match, slated for Friday, May 11.

Entering spring break, Coronado won’t practice this week, as they do not have a scheduled game until their April 16 date with the Mavericks. “We’re off for the break,” said Battle. “I needed the break just as much as the team did.”

CHS Boys Lacrosse Season Underway

Lee Pontes provides a report on the CHS Boys Lacrosse Team, which has regained their form after a tough start to the season. “After opening with three losses against some of the toughest teams in California, Coronado now appears to be settling in nicely for their annual run at the City Conference Championship and an elusive CIF title. Non-competitive losses to Bay Area stalwarts De LaSalle and St. Ignatius High Schools were enough to raise the ire of the team as they traveled to Torrey Pines to take on the locally top-ranked Falcons. The boys surprised the Torrey faithful and jumped out to an early 3-0 first quarter lead. However, the deep and resilient Falcons fought back to tie the game 4-4 at halftime.

Playing the Falcons even in the midfield for the rest of the game, the Islanders just could not get enough possessions in the second half to pull off a second consecutive upset of the Torrey Pines team Coronado defeated at home last year. However, the final score of 12-9 was indicative of the competitive nature of this year’s team. Coronado parents left the game that night already envisioning a rematch, with a potentially different outcome, at some point in the CIF playoffs.

Since that loss March 21, the team his hit their stride with four consecutive victories, all by wide margins. The season’s first victory came at Serra High School where the Islanders defeated a young Conquistador contingent 17-0. Coronado then visited Granite Hills and their young team was able to score seven goals on a tough and physical Islander defense. Coronado won by the final score of 20-7, but it was clear that the Eagles will win several games against East County competition this year.

That win was followed by another lopsided victory in Coronado’s first home game. Employing the ‘true bounce’ of their new artificial turf field, the Islanders dominated Patrick Henry by the score of 13-0. Finally, the team traveled to La Jolla High School Friday evening to engage the Vikings. The first half was vintage Vikings lacrosse, characterized by ball possession, few shot attempts and patience while they waited for the more talented Islander team to make mistakes in the setting sun in La Jolla.

Their strategy appeared to be working nicely as the teams headed into the intermission tied 2-2. However, the La Jolla coaches may have been able to help dictate the pace of the game, but they didn’t have an answer for the setting sun. As the teams emerged at the conclusion of halftime, the blinding sun that baffled the Islander offense in the first half had sunk into the blue Pacific. With the setting sun, the Vikings chances for an upset also vanished. Dominating both ends of the field, the Islander defense limited La Jolla to a single shot on goal in the entire second half. The final score of 9-2 in favor of Coronado reflected the fact that despite the slow-down strategy, the better team prevailed.

With about one-third of the season on the books, Coronado, under the direction of Head Coach Alex Cade, stands atop the City Conference standings with a 4-3 record. The offense has been paced by University of Vermont-bound, standout attackman Geoff Worley, whose seven-goal game against Granite Hills represents the most goals ever scored by an Islander in a single game.

Supporting Worley, particularly in the important offensive areas of passing and assists, is junior attackman Cory Couture. His deft feeds to Worley and Bobby Braun have already led to numerous goals this season. Islander midfield play centers on several players, including converted attackmen Erik Karlsson and Patrick Murphy, senior Jake Vita, and face-off man Austen McRae.

The defense is anchored by hard-hitting senior JJ Pontes, whose hits on Torrey Pines and Granite Hills attackers sent two opposing players to their respective benches in a fog. In Friday night’s game at La Jolla, senior goalie Jake Benzian appears to have hit his stride after making several first half saves that kept that contest close. Long stick middie Chris Carlson is the team’s groundball vacuum, as the senior always seems to find a ground ball when the Islanders need a possession.

Fortunately, the team has a host of younger players whose names will undoubtedly appear in future editions of “Nado Natterings.” As they gain experience, the Islanders are looking forward to another deep run into this year’s CIF playoffs. Be sure to be at Niedermeyer Field for the team’s next home game against LA area powerhouse De Matha High School at 8 pm April 11.”

CHS Baseball Wins Their Lone Game vs. Madison

The Islanders City Conference Tournament experience for 2007 came to an end with their 9-4 victory at Madison, a game played in unusual conditions, according to CHS Head Coach Sam Ceci. “It was like playing in the middle of a sandstorm. It was cold and nasty and the dirt (blown from a nearby sandy parking lot) was flying. It wasn’t one of our finer performances. The wind was just unbelievable.”

Like with most victories, there were some high spots. Offensively, Tim Leary kept his bat hot with three hits, including two doubles, one run scored and an RBI. Other multi-hit games were turned in by Tucker Johnson with two singles and an RBI; Josh Fink was 2-2 with a double; while Chas Marks contributed a single and two RBIs.

Ceci chose to send an array of pitchers to the mound against Madison, using the game as a means to get innings for several of his hurlers. Kyle Couture started the game and threw for 2.2 innings, and was followed to the mound by Stephen Conrad, who threw for one frame and earned the victory. Leary, Fink and Benson Lorden ate up the rest of the innings. “Lorden was pretty effective,” said Ceci of the left-handed senior. “Fink was lights out. He faced four batters and got five outs. Tucker Johnson is throwing real well right now.”

University City won the City Conference Tournament, defeating Cathedral Catholic in the finals. The good news is that Coronado owns an early-season victory over the Centurions. The bad news is that their Western League counterparts are starting to put it together. “U.C. is strong,” Ceci said. “We won the game with them in darkness and we were running out of time. We battled back in the game, which was a credit to us. They are beating everybody right now and they are scoring tons of runs. U.C. is very formidable. I’m glad we don’t get them at the beginning of the Western League schedule.”

This week the Islanders compete in the Lions Tournament and host three games. They play San Pasqual Monday at noon; Brighton, Utah at 2 pm Tuesday; and Saguaro, Arizona at 1:30 pm Wednesday. In an additional treat, the bracket semi-finals and finals will be played at Islander Field (located behind Silver Strand Elementary School) at 10 am and 2 pm respectively.

Softball Squad Breaks Into Western League Win Column

There was cause to celebrate in and around CHS last week, as the CHS Girls Softball Team won their first game in three seasons in the extremely tough Western League. Islander Head Coach Marti Bonelli recaps that contest and brings us up to date on her squad’s progress.

“We opened Western League play March 20^th with a loss to University City 10-1. The game was competitive, with Coronado holding a 1-0 lead going into the fourth inning. The ‘error bug’ bit us hard and UC scored nine unanswered runs, with four tallies coming in the seventh inning.

March 22^nd, we traveled to Castle Park for a non-league contest. We were outplayed by a determined Castle Park team lost 6-1.

March 27^th, we traveled to Point Loma and played in the howling wind. We absorbed a 16-1 loss as the Pointers put the ball in play and we couldn’t catch. Although the home scorebook attributed only four errors to Coronado, our book showed 11. It was a nightmare for freshman pitcher Briana Feist, but she hung in there and made pitch after pitch, getting the desired result. It was just unfortunate that the easy grounders and pop flys couldn’t be handled. We knew from Day 1 of the season that getting better would be a long, slow process. Even though the score didn’t reflect it, we are improving. The team continues to stay positive and works toward a better result.

Last Thursday we hosted Clairemont, and came away with our first Western League victory in three years and the first conquest of the Chieftains in four seasons, by the score of 8-6. Feist again toed the rubber and produced another nice effort, going the distance with six strikeouts, one base on balls, while allowing only two earned runs.

The defense still committed five errors, but we spread them out and avoided the collapses experienced earlier in the season. Sandra Cepin, Brandi Bible, Alexis Wright and Feist all had two-hit games. Lizzie Nebo had the perfect line score every coach loves, with three sacrifice bunts and an RBI in three trips to the plate.

It was a fun game with lead changes back and forth. The girls really got into the competitive nature of the game. The Islanders scored the winning runs in the bottom of the sixth inning, courtesy of a ‘swinging bunt’ by Nora Kaminski to drive in two runs. After that, we shut out Clairemont in their last at bat to earn a very good win. The girls deserve a lot of credit for keeping their heads up and maintaining a positive attitude, even though we have not been playing that well. To their credit, they appreciate the fact that improvement sometimes takes a while.

We have a few days off for spring break and then we start play in the La Jolla Country Day Tournament, with games at the Jewish Community Center Thursday and Friday, April 5 and 6, at 3 pm. Then we have another game Saturday at 9 am and a final game later in the afternoon, depending on the results of pool play.

Islander Track Squad Dashes to Strong Start

CHS Head Track Coach George Green provides an overview of his team’s strong start to the current season. “Team-to-team matchups in track start later in the season than other sports. That big day finally arrived last Wednesday with the Islanders hosting the Clairemont Chieftains at our new track facility. Based on early-season invitational meets, the outcome matched our predictions.

The Girls’ team dominated by the score of 94-40 and the Boys squad came out on the short end of an 86-41 score, despite a great four-event winning effort by junior Kyle Brown and hard-fought matches in all of the distance events.

There are three types of good dual-meet track squads: those with a handful of great athletes who can multiple events; large teams with good athletes who can place in all the events; and large teams with a lot of great athletes. Because all of the sports teams available at CHS and the small size of our school, Coronado must rely on a few great athletes to win dual meets. The girls squad boasts three athletes who are among the county’s best in their specialties, seniors Sarah Player and Danielle Eckert and freshman Sallie Privett.

There are 136 points available in a track meet, based on 14 events scored on a 5-3-1 basis (first, second and third places) and two relays worth five points each for the winning team. If a team can score 69 points (one more than half of the available points) it locks the meet. Because an individual athlete is allowed to run only four events, the most points any individual can score is 20.

Against Clairemont, Player won the 100 hurdles, the 300 hurdles, the 200-meter dash, and the high jump, thus earning a total of 20 points. Privett also scored 20 points by wining the 400, 800, 1600 and 3200 meter runs. She was joined in three of those events (the 400, 800 and 1600) by fellow freshman Adie Davies, who finished second for an additional nine points. Neisha Scales added 13 points in the long jump, and the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes. Eckert contributed 10 points in the pole vault, triple jump and long jump. That represents 72 points from just these five athletes, more than enough to win the meet.

In the wings we have freshmen Danielle Gillberg and Madison Rutherford as understudies to Player. They finished second and third in both hurdle events. Gillberg also placed second in the high jump, who with fellow freshman Briana Giorgione, helped accomplish a sweep in the event for Coronado. Briana also won the pole vault (Eckert had to leave the meet early) and placed second in the 100-meter dash. For full results, please go to IslanderTrack.com.

Although we will lose seniors Player and Eckert next year, the future looks bright for the girls team, because of a strong Coronado Middle School track program. In their first three meets, the CMS girls have outscored the second place team in the South Coast Middle School League by a margin of 3 to 1, or more. These results are also posted on IslanderTrack.com and be reviewed by choosing the middle school link on the website.

Coronado is the only team in the Central League with a lacrosse program which severely dilutes the depth of our boys team. Still, we’ll be contenders against many teams because of our strong distance running program, Kyle Brown (one of the top horizontal jumpers in the state) and a few solid performers in various other events.

Brown won the 100, 200, long jump and triple jump to score nearly half of the team’s points against Clairemont. His 100-meter time of 11.1 was probably faster than the school record, currently held by Marvin Dingle. However, since this event was hand-timed by a single watch, the record can’t be verified. He’ll have plenty of chances to officially better the record when timed electronically later in the season.

Clairemont is the only team in the league that can contend with us in the distance events and they kept our score down by winning the 800, 1600 and 3200-meter runs. It was very close in the 1600, with Clairemont’s Bernardo Bahena finishing about a second in front of Ben Enowitz, with Eamonn McCarey nipping at his heels at the finish line. Bernardo and Ben went 1-2 in the 3200 and David Grimes was nipped at the line by Clairemont’s Nick Pradel. Despite the outcome, the 800 and the 1600 were exciting to watch.

Kenny Twomey placed second in the triple jump and third in the 300 hurdles. Tim Conway was second in the high jump and thrower Tracy Cummings picked up eight points by winning the shot put and placing second in the discus throw.

Three days later, at the Elmer Runge Invitational at Patrick Henry, Player served notice she’s back by winning the 100-meter hurdles in school record time of 16.15. She also won the 300-meter hurdles in one of the top times of the season county-wide in 46.32. Immediately afterwards, she came back in the 200-meter dash to win going away in a new school record time of 25.55. She also placed second in the high jump with a jump of 5-l. For all of this, she was named Female Track Athlete of the meet.

In the inaugural Thom Hunt Mile, Privett placed third with a personal record of 5:16.32. The mile is about 10 yards longer than the 1600-meter run, which is the distance usually run in high school. This time converts to a 5:14.5 for the 1,600, one of the top times in the county so far this season. Davies finished 11^th in the same race, also with a personal record of 5:41.01, the equivalent to a 5:39 run for 1600 meters.

Scales won her heat of the 100-meter dash in 13.42; Giorgione received her first taste of invitational-level pole vaulting, and cleared 7 feet; Grimes ran 57.37 and 2:14 in the 400 meters and 800 meters respectively; Twomey tripled jumped 38-1 to finish 11^th and Brown placed second in both the triple jump and long jump events behind Gary Lee of Hoover, one of the county’s top jumpers.”

Boys Tennis Competes Well in Western League Matches

CHS Boys Tennis Head Coach Robbin Adair provides us with his team’s week in review. “We had two Western League matches this week, and were without two of our starters, Krishna Samperio and Chris Mitchell. Samperio missed both matches, while Mitchell had his wisdom teeth removed and missed Thursday’s match with St. Augustine.

Tuesday we lost to Scripps Ranch 17-1. We were shorthanded, but played really well. Coronado’s singles players Andrew Stump, Brenton Mashburn, and Mitch Moran got swept by three really good, and really mature players.

Over in doubles, it was a lot closer. Daniel Grazian and Frankie Harrison, playing No. 1 lost 6-4, 6-3, 6-1, while Evan Wheeler and Mitchell won our only point, beating their No. 1 team 6-4. They lost to the Falcon’s No. 2 and No. 3 teams by the scores of 6-3 and 6-4. The first-time team of Patrick Holman and Jordan Vance played well, but lost all three of their sets 6-2, 6-0, and 6-3.

Thursday we traveled to Morley Field, where St. Augustine beat us 17-4. Again the singles players of Wheeler, Mashburn and Stump were swept, but there were several good sets played. In doubles Grazian/Harrison won two sets. They lost to the No. 1 team 6-4 and then beat the No. 2 and No. 3 teams 6-3 and 6-4. Moran accounted for the other two wins by scores of 1-6, 6-4 and 7-5.

We have no matches over Easter Break, but we will host University City Tuesday April 10 when we return.”