Trevor Newquist gets to live a dream today.
Twice.
At 8 p.m., the Torrey Pines (Calif.) standout will at last play in the finals of a San Diego Section Division I basketball tournament against top seed El Camino (29-3) at Jenny Craig Pavilion on the campus of University of San Diego.
Coach John Olive won’t have to worry that his team’s leader in virtually every statistical category isn’t warmed up.
“We just hope he gets to the game unscathed,” he said.
That’s because six hours earlier, Newquist will slip into cleats and lead the Torrey Pines soccer team (17-4-3) into the SDS Division I championship against Westview (18-3-2) at Valhalla High. The 6-foot-3, 170-pound senior is the team’s top all-around player and leading scorer despite missing six games.
“It’s going to be a big day that’s for sure,” Newquist said at 10:30 Friday night. “I better get some rest.”
Trevor Newquist drives hard to the basket.
Staff photo by Todd Shurtleff
Two-sport athletes are uncommon these days.
Two-sport athletes who compete the same season are truly rare.
Two-sport athletes who compete the same season and are Division I caliber at both is mind jarring.
Especially two sports as physically taxing and athletically demanding as basketball and soccer.
And then to play in two large-division championship games in a highly-populated metropolitan region on the same day?
Fiction.
“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” Torrey Pines soccer coach Andy Hargreaves said. “And he gets straight A too.”
Who is this kid? RoboJock?
“Obviously he is a fantastic athlete to excel at these two sports,” said Olive, a former NBA player for the Clippers (1978-80) and head coach at Loyola Marymount (1992-97). “To do it at the same time, to be a great leader on both teams and to excel in the classroom speaks to what a special person he is.”
But special athletes can exert just so much energy. Even at 17. How has the spindly but strong standout endured?
“Nutrition, lots of sleep and being smart,” Newquist said. “Last couple weeks I’ve got B-12 shots and taken ice baths.”
Ice baths? Ouch.
“Fifty degree water,” he said. “The first five minutes are gruesome. Then you get used to it.”
He slept 13½ hours Thursday night into Friday morning. It’s his longest snooze yet since taking on the ambitious dual identity starting in November.
He’s starred at both sports since he was a youth but never played on two teams at once until, of all people, his mom Linda gave him the idea last year.
She read about a female high school athlete who tried both sports at once and asked her son if he thought he could do it.
“She wasn’t asking or daring me,” Newquist said. “She was just being inquisitive and it just made me wonder. ”
So, out of the blue and under no advisement, Newquist e-mailed San Diego Section Commissioner Dennis Ackerman and asked if there were any rules against playing two sports the same season.
When the response was no, he went to Olive to get his blessing.
Soccer has always been Newquist’s first sport. He learned it in Italy, where his family lived for three years and when they returned, Newquist advanced quickly in club and development leagues.
He loved basketball and was good at it also. When he got to Torrey Pines he hooked his healthy legs to the hoops wagon and trained at soccer the other eight months.
At 6-3 with long limbs and excellent hops, he’s a good-sized guard in basketball. On the soccer field, he’s something of a physical freak, able to win every ball in the air while quick and skilled enough to match anyone on the ground.
He accepted a full ride soccer scholarship to St. Mary’s College in the fall despite never playing a minute for Torrey Pines.
“I always wanted to play for my school in soccer, but it conflicted with basketball,” said Newquist, a three-year basketball starter and captain for the Falcons. “My senior year I thought I’d give it a shot.”
Coach Olive directs a weary Newquist.
Staff photo by Todd Shurtleff
Olive said fine as long as he didn’t miss practice and of course, games. Hargreaves gladly took any portion of one of San Diego’s premier talents.
So, for the last four months plus, Newquist has weaved his way from soccer practice early in the afternoon to late-afternoon basketball practice. Conflicts favored the basketball team.
“When he first told me about the idea we were hesitant,” his father Gunnar Newquist said. “But it’s what he wanted to do and as long as he didn’t get hurt we were encouraging.”
Trevor Newquist was born with good lungs. His dad was a football and track standout at Fremont High in Sunnyvalle. His mom swam and played tennis at Miramonte in Orinda.
But good genes and stamina can't explain his ability to survive the rigors of such a laborous schedule.
Newquist has played in all 30 basketball games (26 wins) and leads the team in scoring (13.8 points per game), rebounding (7.0), assists (3.8) and steals (2.6). He’s played in 18 of the team’s 24 soccer games and leads the team in scoring.
He had an assist in the team’s 1-0 opening-round win over Mira Mesa, the only goal in a 1-0 semifinal victory over Rancho Buena Vista and the team’s first goal in a 4-1 semifinal triumph over Escondido.
At the same time he was dazzling outside, he went indoors to combine for 39 points, 26 rebounds, 13 assists and six steals in three SDS playoff basketball wins.
This is when Newquist was supposed to be withering away to jelly.
“I have to admit he continues to prove all of us wrong,” Gunnar said. “I sometimes can’t believe he can still do it. I just think it’s passion he has for the games he plays and the teammates he shares it with.”
Newquist doesn’t pretend any of it has been easy.
“It’s definitely been a roller coaster ride,” he said. “Sometimes I’ve been so tired at practice coach Olive said he can read my face and just know how I’m feeling. But by game time, when it’s time to step up, pure adrenalin kicks in. I just try to stay mentally tough.”
Winning sure helps.
The soccer team lost 5-0 to Westview (18-3-2) on Valentine’s Day but Newquist and four other starters sat out to rest up for the playoffs.
“That’s taking nothing away from Westview, they’re a very good team,” Newquist said. “But we definitely think we can win this game.”
Lacing up the sneakers and beating El Camino, the state’s No. 23 team, some four hours later will be a long shot. Then again, the Falcons fought back from a 12-point halftime deficit against old nemesis San Diego, the team that eliminated it last year, to win 59-52 in the quarterfinals.
Newquist outscored one of the nation’s top juniors, 6-10 Jeremy Tyler 19-15, to go along with eight rebounds and five assists.
In the semifinals, Newquist fouled out with 17 seconds left but his replacement Ramsey Hopkins hit a 6-foot follow shot at the buzzer to beat La Costa Canyon 57-56. Hopkins was carried off the court.
“It’s been kind of a magical ride, so I wouldn’t count anything out,” Newquist said.
Olive isn’t counting out another improbable scenario – Newquist actually walking on and making the St. Mary’s basketball team next season. It follows the fall college soccer season after all. None of this two-sport, one-season hanky panky.
“After seeing what Trevor has done here (the last four months) I would say he’s capable of pretty much anything,” Olive said.
E-mail Mitch Stephens at mstephens@maxpreps.com.
To see how Newquist fared on Saturday, click here.
