Anyone wanting to be present when DODDS-Europe determines its 2010 tennis and cross country champions faces a serious choice on Saturday. The tennis finals are scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. that day at the Tenniszentrum Vitis, located in sugar-beet fields just north of the Wiesbaden suburb of Nordenstadt. Ninety minutes later, the school-system’s best girls’ cross-country runners will begin their 5,000-meter, four-lap jaunt around the sand hills at the Tompkins Barracks training center in the Heidelberg suburb of Schwetzingen. DODDS-Europe’s top boy runners will set out an hour after the girls.
Whichever event you choose to watch, you’ve made the right choice.
The story lines at this year’s tennis tournament are whether two-time girls’ champ Ginevra Bolla, a Marymount International School of Rome junior, can make it three straight, and whether defending boys’ champ Nikolay Godpodinov of SHAPE can fend off the challenges of top-seeded freshman Ajdir Tahirovic of Patch and No. 3 Patrick Tan of International School of Brussels. Tahirovic has played neither of the Belgium-based stars yet, but Tan defeated Gospodinov last week.
Unlike tennis, there’s only one defending individual champion in the cross country finale. Sophomore Katherine Castro of Patch came out of nowhere to win the 2009 crown, but ironically has seen newcomers arrive this year as serious threats to her chances for repeating.
The unlucky Castro hasn’t won a race this year, due almost entirely to her new teammate, Morgan Mahlock. Castro, who tamed Schwetzingen’s clover-leaf in 20 minutes, 16 seconds last year, has compiled more than respectable times in five races this year, with her best coming during the fourth week at 20:10.
Mahlock, however, a mysterious newcomer who shuns publicity, has beaten Castro every time out, setting course records along the way. Mahlock broke the 20-minute barrier in Week 2, set a home-course record of 19:40 in Week 3, topped that with a course-record 18:40 at SHAPE the following week, then broke her own course record at home by running 19:35 in Week 5. She dipped back under 19 minutes last Saturday at Vilseck with a winning time of 18:47.
She’s undefeated and apparently indefatigable. Before that final race, her coach, Tom Manuel, anticipating a team with legs tired out from his planned “hell-week” practice, predicted, “Our times won’t be very good this week.”
Mahlock, however, seems just to be getting warmed up. Her biggest challenge will come from another 2010 transfer, Jessica Kafer of Ramstein. The senior, who moved from Honolulu, ran a home-course record 19:24.67 in her debut meet, and hasn’t slowed down.
In complete contrast to what appears to be a two-runner duel for the girls, the boys‘ race figures to be as wide open as the start-finish area at Schwetzingen.
Ramstein’s Jack Scranton threw his hat into an already crowded field of contenders by running a winning 17:07 last Saturday at Kaiserslautern, two full seconds ahead of his teammate and bona fide contender, Carl Lewenhaupt. Sean Wilson of Aviano tuned up for Saturday with a course-record 17:32 last week at Sigonella, and Lakenheath’s Archie Robertson and Vilseck’s Zane Kennedy each ran under 17 minutes Saturday. Robertson set a course record of 16:29 at Menwith Hill, obliterating the old mark of 17:39, and Kennedy clocked 16:54.07 at Vilseck, .61 seconds faster than Tyler Gamble of Patch who was hard on his heels. Also in Saturday’s boys mix is Ian Eversman of Naples, who ran a 17:07 Saturday in Rome.
Defending team champs are the 10-time defending champion Ramstein boys and Ramstein’s girls in Division I, the Naples boys and girls in Division II, and the Brussels boys and girls in D-III.
Ramstein coach Dennis Edwards, for one, sees a lively competition for this years’ D-I crowns, with his Royal girls challenged by Patch and Kaiserslautern. He sees his boys and Patch, both boasting quality depth, as “very, very close.”
The tennis and cross country finales close the season on three of the schools' five fall sports. Golf ended two weeks ago; football and volleyball will be settled Nov. 6.
Goalkeeper Andrew Glubzinski of Hohenfels shut out Navy in regulation Sunday at Hurlburt Field, Fla., to help the All-Army team defeat the sailors 4-3 in a shootout which followed the championship game of the Armed Forces soccer tournament, according to an E-mail sent to Stars and Stripes on Monday by Army sports director Ken Polk.
Sunday's schedule is set for the final day of the 2010 U.S. Forces-Europe soccer tournament at Aviano Air Base, Italy.
In the all-Air Force semifinals on Saturday, Aviano blanked Spangdahlem 1-0 and Lakenheath topped Ramstein 2-1 to move into Sunday's 2 p.m. title game. Spang and Ramstein will battle at noon Sunday for third place in this annual fall event.
Tomas Villegas Jr., who oversees the assignment of basketball officials to DODDS-Europe high school games, is seeking officials to work games this season in Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Italy.
DODDS-Europe athletic director Karen Seadore announced via e-mail on Friday that the previously unbeaten Heidelberg Lions football team had forfeited its 54-19 on-field victory last Saturday at Wiesbaden for refusing to take the field for a conversion try by the Warriors at game’s end.
If you can work it into your schedule this Saturday afternoon, plan to be at Ramstein High School at 1 p.m. for an intriguing end-of-regular season showdown between the defending European D-I champion Royals and Filton College of Bristol, England. Ramstein must win, and by 13 points or more, to claim the I-North championship and the right to host the No. 2 team from I-South the following week in the European D-I playoffs.
Filton, playing its first season in DODDS-Europe, defeated Ramstein 26-3 Oct. 2 in England. If Filton wins again Saturday, or if Ramstein prevails by 12 points or fewer, the English school would win the I-North crown first time out of the box. Filton, a sports academy team, would then host the yet-to-be determined No. 2 team from I-South in one European D-I semifinal game on Oct. 30. Ramstein would finish second and travel to I-South champ Heidelberg.
Those wanting to attend a Division II quarterfinal football game this week will have to clear their schedules for Saturday afternoon. Bamberg, which visits Mannheim, and International School of Brussels, which is to travel to unbeaten II-South champion Ansbach, declined offers to play on Friday night. Previously, Mannheim had played all its home games on Friday; Ansbach one of its three.
That leaves Division II, which opens its European playoffs a week earlier than the other two divisions, with the following 1 p.m. Saturday kick-offs:
Al Schaff, the Kaiserslautern Officials’ Association wrestling commissioner, sent this E-mail Monday describing the need for new officials to work DODDS-Europe wrestling matches this season:
“A serious shortage of high school wrestling referees, especially in the areas of Hohenfels, Vilseck, Bamberg and Ansbach, provides a good chance for former wrestlers or coaches to earn extra money while giving back to the sport.
If you’re in the Wiesbaden area Thursday and Friday, consider taking in the 2010 DODDS-Europe golf tournament at the Rheinblick golf course.
Forty-seven teen-agers will attack Rheinblick’s hillside layout beginning at 9 a.m. each day. At the end of 36 holes, their modified Stableford scores will be totaled up and the top boy and girl and top boys’ and girls’ teams will receive the first trophies of the 2010-2011 school year.
Highlight of this year’s event will be the continuing duel between defending girls’ champ Hollie Salvo of Wiesbaden and Elizabeth Ward of Ramstein.
Salvo, a junior, outscored Ward 62-50 last year under the system which awards one point for double-bogey, two for bogey, three for par, four for birdie and six for eagle or ace. However, Ward, a senior, has averaged 37 points for each competitive 18 holes she’s played this fall to 36 for Salvo. And, in a head-to-head matchup last Thursday, Ward defeated Salvo 33-25. The battle appears to be joined.
Seven other girls qualified for the field, but the best of them is averaging a full 14 fewer points-per-round behind Salvo.
The boys’ crown, on paper at least, is up for grabs.
Mackenzie Bradley, third in Europe in 2009, is the highest-scoring boy going in at 45.3 points-per-round, but not far behind the Kaiserslautern junior is his senior teammate Caleb Hayes at 42.7. Ramstein, which qualified 11 of the 38 boys’ finalists, has three players averaging in the 40s – senior Jordan Linder at 43.7, junior James Cho at 42.0, and sophomore Christian Gunia at 41.5.
Heidelberg has two 40-point-scorers teeing off Thursday in defense of its boys’ title – senior Mike Baltich, the 2009 runner-up, at 41.0, and sophomore Joseph Patrick at 40.3.
Admission is free and the weather's glorious. Any reason not to go?
My blog telling of AFN's second anual airing of the Super Six high school football championship tripleheader on Nov. 6 contained an erroneous Web-site for those wanting to tap into streaming video of the games. AFN's Pentagon Channel's the right place to go for the live telecast, but the games will stream begining at noon, Nov. 6, at afneurope.net.
Please note the change. I'd hate to have you miss any of the games because of my ineptitude.
Because there are so few teams playing football in DODDS-Europe, a weekly Top 10 list isn’t necessary. The standings tell the tale, and quickly.
But Sam Lightle, who runs the Europe High School Football Web-site, http://hsfootballeurope.net/, has come up with a Top 10 which covers the past five seasons. While most can probably guess that Ansbach, which went undefeated for most of that period in compiling a DODDS-Europe record 31-game victory streak and collected three European titles along the way, would lead the list, some of the others aren’t quite as obvious.
That’s especially the case for the 10th-place team, tiny Menwith Hill, which concluded the five seasons in question at 16-15 despite having one of the smallest enrollments in Europe every year.
Here’s Mr. Lightle’s list:
Best in Europe 2005-2009
Team W-L Pct. 2010 record
1. Ansbach 37-3 .925 4-0
2. Ramstein 35-5 .875 3-1
3. AFNORTH 29- 6 .828 1-3
4. Bitburg 27- 9 750 4-0
5. Heidelberg 28-12 .700 4-0
6. Baumholder 23-12 .657 2-2
7. Naples 22- 12 .647 2-2
8. Rota 21- 12 .617 1-3
9. Wiesbaden 19-17 .527 2-2
10. Menwith Hill 16-15 .516 1-3
This is just the tip of the information iceberg available at hsfootballeurope.net. How about checking it out? I’m betting, figuratively only, of course,you’ll want to bookmark the site once you’ve been there.
Have any thoughts on which school is likely to top the 2010-2014 standings? Share them with us, please.
For the second straight year, AFN television will bring the season-ending high school football Divisions I, II and III championship games live to viewers across Europe and Southwest Asia, AFN-Europe’s George Smith wrote Thursday in a response to an E-mail question from Stars and Stripes.
Unlike last year, however, AFN radio will not simulcast the games, which kick off at noon, Nov. 6, with the D-III finale. The Division II title game is to follow at 2:30 p.m., and the D-I game is set from a 5 p.m. kickoff, all on Minick Field at Baumholder’s Smith Barracks.
Even though it seems as though the high school football campaign just started, the regular season enters its second half this weekend. For fans wanting to take in a meaningful game or two this week, visits to Mannheim on Friday night and Wiesbaden on Saturday afternoon are in order.
In Wiesbaden, at 1 p.m. at the high school field on the hill above the Hainerberg Shopping Center, the Warriors will be out to avenge their opening-day, 47-22 loss in Heidelberg on Sept. 18. Wiesbaden, behind the running of Daniel Harris and the quarterbacking of Ryan Reagin, has won two straight since the Heidelberg episode.
Crew Cohoes, 11-year-old brother of European D-I champion Patch’s All-Europe shortstop Cavan Cohoes, was named MVP of the German national championship tournament on Sunday in Berlin, his father, Chris, wrote in an E-mail to Stars and Stripes on Monday. Crew, a pitcher-shortstop-catcher, won the award after leading the Stuttgart Reds to the national championship for 10-12-year-olds.
The Reds, who had never before even qualified for the national tournament, won all four of their five-inning games in Berlin, including Sunday’s 16-6 championship-game victory, the elder Cohoes reported.
An E-mail Monday from DODDS-Europe athletic director Karen Seadore announced that because Alconbury used an ineligible player in the Dragons’ 26-20 double-overtime victory over visiting Sigonella on Sept. 25, Alconbury must forfeit the game. Officially, she wrote, Sigonella is the winner of the contest. Final score is 1-0.
The reversal puts Sigonella atop the Division III standings with a 2-0 record after two official road games. The Jaguars defeated Rota 21-18 at home on Sept. 18, but all D-III games that day officially were designated as "preseason" and therefore don’t count in the league standings.
Univeristy of Dubuque sophomore Nick Garcia, a three-time DODDS-Europe singles champion as a Heidelberg Lion, won the USTA Midwest Regional championship Sunday at St. Peter, Minn., to become the first-ever UD player to qualify for the USTA/ITA National Small College Championships.
According to UD administrator Bon Broshous, the sixth-seeded Garcia earned his Midwest Regional title and national championship berth with a 6-1, 6-1 rout of Jake Macey of Wisconsin-Whitewater in Sunday's title match. En route to that match, Broshous wrote in an E-mail on Monday, Garcia, UD’s first-ever tennis all-American, won four matches with the loss of just a single set. Included in Garcia’s run was a 6-2, 6-3 victory over Luther College’s Scott Sundstrom, the man who had beaten him in last fall’s Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championship match.
The National Small College championships are scheduled to be played Oct. 14-17 in Mobile, Ala.
If you’re into the futures market, Saturday’s cross country results from Patch High School form a compelling “buy” alert for the Lady Panthers in 2011 and beyond.
No fewer than three middle-school girls from Patch's feeder area finished among the top 11 overall at Saturday’s four-team high school race, won by Patch newcomer Morgan Mahlock in a course-record time of 19 minutes, 40 seconds, for the 5,000-meter layout.
