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GOING

Editor-in-ChiEf

by Katie Arquiette

Volleyball team strugglesbut hopes to finish strong

BusinEss ManagEr

by Delaney Mills

Deep in concentration, senior Kate Moore serves the ball to Colonial Forge in a mid-season district match.

SERVE

photos by Joey DzurenDa

Fighting for the last couple of points, junior Tonya Denny-Rochester keeps the panthers alive for one more point against the Eagles.

SLAM

>> Golf Report

s4october ports

Cross country off to best start since 2000

Young golfers key to teams future

Over the years, the golf team has had sev-eral ups and downs while struggling to stay competitive in the Commonwealth district.

Many of these hardships can be contribut-ed to youth and inexperience, as seen by this season, however, the youth this year showed a lot of potential.

This season, the youth on the golf team showed a lot of improvement throughout the course of the year. A lot of learning took place during the season as well.

“The biggest thing that I learned and im-proved on this season was my understanding of tournament play,” freshman Chris Weak-land said.

Learning the rules of the tournament are vital for young freshmen like Weakland be-cause he was one of the members of the team that regularly competed in them this season.

“We worked really hard this year and the freshmen even got to go to districts, we hope

staff WritEr

by Joey Dzurenda to carry over this success into next season, continue to build on what we have been do-ing, improve and get better,” Weakland said.

Those specific goals that have been set for the freshmen on the team, for next season are vital to their overall success because they know what they have to do and improve on in the offseason.

“Freshmen always have the time and po-tential to improve. With youth comes inexpe-rience,” head golf coach Dave Coppage said.

“Time tends to take care of one of those is-sues. As experience is acquired, it is expected that learning and improvement will follow.”

When these freshmen become juniors and seniors, not only will they gain more experi-ence, but they will be much more competi-tive, which will help the team become a bet-ter contender in every tournament.

“All of the freshmen and young players on the team got a lot better as the year went on, as we practice in the off season and through next summer we should be ready to go come next season,” junior Holton Chason said.

Attempting to lower his score, Senior Robert Lee lines up his shot before putting the ball. The golf team ended their season sixth in their District.

LININ’ IT UP photo by Sami michalick

New field hockey head coach, Samantha Fredo, has built a stronger sense of team unity, a more organized, supportive and responsible varsity field hockey team.

Compared to years past, Fredo has changed the team’s procedures and rules to create a competitive group of athletes.

“I require the team to ride to and from all games together and for both teams to stay dur-ing home games to support the other team: Var-sity staying to support junior varsity and vice-versa. The practice times have been extended compared years past, and I also stress the im-portance of being at all practices,” Fredo said.

Although the team finished with a 2-13 re-cord so far, the girls’ improved greatly and have been competitive.

“We have improved since last year. This year we lost to Colonial Forge 3-2 in double overtime to Mountain View 1-0. When we played Moun-tain View last year, we lost twice 8-0 and again 10-0, so we have improved. We need to capital-ize on our scoring opportunities,” Fredo said.

staff WritEr

by Anna Rice

Field hockey improves with new coachWinning is a priority for both the coach and

the players but the rules and strict nature of the sport has affected some.

“I like our new coach a lot but the rule about attending junior varsity games and the longer practices have given me more stress than when I played in years past. With all the homework I have I’m still trying to learn to manage my time. We have gotten a lot better though, so I can’t complain. The more practices and more obligations are making us better,” junior Katie Fulton said.

This _is Fredo’s first year as a head coach, even though she has coached here for three years. Being head coach for the first time comes with struggles.

“As a head coach, I have more responsibility because the program relies on me. I’ve made changes and it’s been an adjustment for the players,” Fredo said. “It’s always a struggle as a new head coach because I’m questioned by players and parents, I have to have confidence in myself and know that I’m doing what is best for the team and my players. I am here to make the program better and more successful.”

THEDISTANCEWaiting for the meet to start, the girls cross country team prepares for their 3.1 mile trek at Willowmere Park in Stafford. With the regular season coming to a close, both the boys’ and girls’ cross country teams prepare for Districts on October 23.WAITING TO BEGIN photos by matt kelly

Bump, set, spike, another point goes onto the score board; they’re doing great this match, the opposing team that is.

The bleachers are always full of adoring, spir-ited Panther fans, but it seems that this has not been enough to pull out victories this season.

Despite hard work, effort and the loss of relatively few starters, predictions of continu-ing on with great records after finishing third in the Commonwealth last season have not come true for the lady panthers thus far.

“This season has not gone according to plan and the girls have not been playing up to the same level as last year’s team, but the girls are starting to show signs that they are close to regaining the spark,” coach Robert Walsh said.

To get the flame burning again, the Pan-thers look towards experience.

“[Junior] Kaitlin Kemp is one of the stand out players this season,” sophomore Gwen Stitcher said. “She can pick anybody up after they messed up or made a bad play.”

Another star player is senior Melanie Jank-ovits, who is 39 assists short of the school as-sist record.

Even with outstanding players covering the court, the team morale has been maintained throughout the season.

“It’s vital for every player to be up and in good spirits, because if they’re not it definite-ly affects the whole team,” Kemp said.

The lady panthers will start their Common-wealth District Tournament play on Oct. 28.

In an attempt to get to the ball, freshman Haley Kane rushes to beat her oppo-nent. The girls’ next game is tonight at 4 p.m. against Riverbend High School.

EYE ON THE BALL photo by chriS hagan

After finishing last at the Commonwealth District meet last year, members of the Cross Country team were looking to improve with the new season and start out fresh.

“The past few years on cross country defi-nitely weren’t the best they could be, we lacked motivation and needed more of a push to do better by the coaches,” senior Sam Morrison said. “This year we were all looking for an improvement of some sort because we wanted to succeed.”

For the team, that improvement was evi-dent on the first day of practice when they

were greeted by a new coach, ninth grade English teacher Kelli Benefield.

“I knew the school was looking for a new coach and since I love the sport I decided to accept when [Jim] Manchester asked me to take the job,” Benefield said. “I had been an assistant coach for King George and I loved working with the runners.”

Not only was Benefield excited about coaching, but she too was determined to im-prove the team’s standing in the district.

“I expect to give my runners some good fundamental skills and to improve on our District standing,” Benefield said. “I feel this season is [already] an improvement from the

past; the runners have high expectations of themselves and some great personal goals.”

Members of the team feel her dedication.“Coach Benefield is really committed to

trying to make us better runners,” sopho-more Tyler Ellis said.

The improvement of the team is already evidenced by their performances in meets and invitationals so far.

“We’ve definitely been doing a lot better this year than in the past,” junior Taylor Ull-rich said. “At meets we are actually competi-tive with the other teams and I like feeling as though we have a good chance at placing .”

With improvement also comes hard work.

“The team is a great environment, every-one is cool with everyone,” junior Tony Chie-sa said. “Coach is good and we definitely are doing a lot of running which is good .”

Morrison agrees.“We’re definitely a lot better this year,”

Morrison said. “Our new coach is a lot tough-er and she makes us better runners.”

When it comes to the district meet this year, the team feels that they are more than ready to compete and show off the hard work they have been doing in practice.

“I think we all are just excited to go to dis-tricts and show to everyone that we’ve im-proved a lot,” Morrison said.

knowthefacts

junior Liz Bickerstaff

junior Will Callies

freshman Gabby Martinez freshman Chris Ducic senior Sam Morrison junior Tony Chiesa senior Kacey Hall senior Joey Brown senior Matt Mittura senior Katie Arquiette

2number of girls on the team

3number of lefty’s on the team

number of holes in a match