Kasey Carlson had to do it all over again, but this time she was even better.
The standout junior swimmer from Las Lomas (Walnut Creek, Calif.) had established a national record the previous week by winning the 100-yard breaststroke in a sizzling 58.89 seconds during the Diablo Foothill Athletic League Championships – only to later learn it would not count because the touchpads that register times weren’t working.
So, she took a deep breath last Friday during the North Coast Section preliminaries and lowered the uncounted mark with an even swifter clocking of 58.75 seconds. This one counted.
That time would have placed her third in this year’s NCAA meet.
“I was really nervous,” she told Kyle Bonagura of the Contra Costa Times. “I just had to assure myself that I could do it again. It’s a big weight lifted off my shoulders.”
Meanwhile, another Californian, Tom Shields was grabbing his share of the spotlight by swimming the 200-yard freestyle in a national-record 1:33.83 during the CIF Southern Section Division I preliminaries. The Huntington Beach Edison senior, who is headed for the University of California, told Dan Albano of the Orange County Register, “I was going for it (the record), but not by that much. I never thought I could go that fast this year.”
He was referring to the shocking margin he established. The national public school record had been 1:35.55 by Eric Diehl of Mission Viejo (Calif.) in 1991. The national private school record is 1:34.96 by Olympian Joe Hudepohl of St. Xavier (Cincinnati, Ohio), also in 1991.
Fans are passionate
High school sports fans are quite loyal – and passionate.
Those traits never were more thoroughly demonstrated than with the recent hiring of Allentown’s Pat Dowling as the new head football coach at Brick Township (N.J.). He replaces legendary Warren Wolf, the school’s only football coach in history and winner of a state-record 361 games during his 51-year career.
The problem? Dowling is an “outsider” and the majority of Brick fans wanted someone from Wolf’s staff or at least someone who had been in the system at one time or another. The other two finalists were Len Zdanowicz, a 12-year Brick assistant, and Tim Osborn, a former Brick assistant now at Toms River North.
Newark Star-Ledger writer Jackie Friedman described this incredible scene: “Hundreds of livid Brick football fans rushed for the double doors of the Lake Riviera Middle School’s multipurpose room after last Thursday’s Brick Township Board of Education meeting. They were screaming and staring, crying and cursing.”
Brick alumnus Don Ayers summed it up succinctly when he noted, “I’ve seen happier funerals.”
There are over 1,000 signatures on a petition which states, “Keep the Brick Football Coach Job in Brick.” The Township Council has passed a resolution that asks, if at all possible, to keep promotions from the inside.
Protestors are everywhere and Wolf has been leading the charge. He even has volunteered to come back for a 52nd year if the outsider is not ousted. Wolf met with Dowling several weeks before his hiring. He told him, “You’re walking into a hornets’ nest because the people don’t want you. I can’t support you.”
They want stability and don’t like Dowling’s track record of working and coaching in eight different school districts during the past 20 years.
Surprisingly, the Board of Education voted unanimously for Dowling, with one abstention. Supt. Walter Hrycenko indicated the decision was based on hiring the best coach and there never had been any thoughts of a possible backlash.
For the past several months, Dowling and has wife, Teri, have been forced to hide the newspapers from their six children so they don’t see what is being written about their father.
In the fall, fans’ disenchantment will grow even deeper when Dowling switches from Wolf’s longtime Wing-T formation to a multiple Power-I offense.
At this time Dowling does not know who his assistants will be, or for that matter, if anybody will be in the stands to watch his team play.
Still, he says firmly, “This, to me, is the Mecca of high school football. I put in for this for one reason: I considered it the best job in the state to have.”
Loyalty and passion also were present in Kalida, Ohio, where fan support has kept Dick Kortokrax at the helm of the local high school baseball team.
The 75-year-old Kortokrax – who is the winningest prep baseball coach in the state – was diagnosed with bladder cancer two years ago and agreed to step down after the 2009 campaign. However, his health has improved (the team reached the state championship this spring) and he asked to stay on. The school board, instead, chose to interview new candidates.
Enter the fans, who loved every one of the 785 victories he has notched over the past 49 years. The board finally gave in to the pressure and granted him at least one more year – but not the three he had requested.
Fowler bows out in style
Softball superstar Kenzie Fowler ended her brilliant career by pitching Tucson Canyon del Oro (33-2) to a 4-0 victory over No. 1-ranked Vail Cienega for its third consecutive Arizona Class 4A-Division I state championship.
She yielded her first hit, a single, in the seventh inning. Then she struck out the side to close out her career on the same diamond (University of Arizona) where she will play next year as a college freshman. Earlier in the tournament, Fowler fired four consecutive no-hitters.
In March, Fowler had lost a one-hitter to Vail Cienega, 1-0, on an unearned run.
Fowler concluded her career with a 105-8 record, including a 15-1 mark in state playoff competition.
Kenzie Fowler, Canyon del Oro (Ariz.)
Le Duc, Earl Win ‘gym’ titles
Kaylan Earls and Lizzy Le Duc were the “A” Division champions who were crowned over the weekend during the annual Women’s U.S. Junior Olympic National Championships at the Fair Showplex in Puyallup, Wash.
Earls, a home-schooled high school junior from Chicago, Ill., won the Senior A all-around title with a score of 38.400. She also won the uneven bars (9.500) and tied for first on the balance beam (9.550). She belongs to Arena Gymnastics in Joliet, Ill.
The 16-year-old Le Duc, of Baytown, Texas, competes for the Woodlands Gymnastics Association. She won the Junior A all-around title with a score of 37.750 points. She also captured first place on the balance beam with a score of 9.475.
