The story of the 2010 Santa Cruz Interscholastic League soccer and volleyball seasons could be summed up in two word: Jaguars won.The Cooperative Jaguars won the championship trophies in all four varsity competitions: boys soccer, girls soccer, boys volleyball and girls volleyball. It represented the first time in League history that one school has won all the varsity competitions in one season, and this season will be the first real test of whether it can be done again.
Cooperative’s girls soccer and volleyball teams, if not favorites to repeat, are almost certain to have a shot at doing so. But the picture in boys soccer and volleyball is much more obscure. Both seasons in those sports start off in “anything can happen” mode.
Girls Soccer: Can Jaguar epoch end in glory?
The Jaguar girls soccer team has never lost the championship since the founding of the League in 2005, and hasn’t lost a game since 2007. (There have been two ties.)
The only players from last year who will be conspicuously absent from this year’s starting line-up is last year’s captain, Aldana Roda, and Maria Jose Rivero. Many players on the team have been starters since seventh grade or earlier. They fully intend to go out in the style to which they have accustomed themselves.
These include Fernanda Vaca Diez, Tania Landivar, Sofia Sotelo, Ana Peredo, Maria Paz Rivero, Rose Leny Kefer, Audrey Saucedo, and Macarena Valdes, Paola Querejazu, and Paolina Aguirre, among others. The girls teams will once again be coached by Rolando Cabrera.
If any team can beat them, it is probably International. The Griffins almost did it last year when they were ahead 1-0 with only minutes remaining. The Griffins sabotaged themselves when a defender accidently deflected a Jaguar corner kick into her own goal, and then the Griffins were unable to stop a Jaguar breakway that gave Cooperative a squeaky thin 2-1 final moments win. The Griffins have been training since late July with their new coach, Mauro Blanco, a former member of the Bolivian national team and coach of the Santa Cruz team. Their goal has reportedly been to beat Cooperative. (Blanco is assisted by Jesus Flores and Wilfredo Cabant, both new assistant coaches.) The Griffin players intend to remember that for their entire varsity careers the Jaguars have been unbeaten - and unbeatable.
The Griffins, for their part, did lose Natalia Suarez, Adriana Ocampo, Regina Landivar, Stephanie Gioto, Matrilde Gamarra, and Maria Isabela Barrenechea, but coach Blanco says he still has plenty of experienced players who can make good use of the ball possession style of play he favors. These include Flavia Nostas, Maria Victoria Gutierrez, Beatriz Nallar, Camila Johnson Florencia Sosa, and Natalia Davila.
So the year will not be without a certain sense of potential drama
Christian Learning’s girls will hope to be dark horse contenders. The Eagle girls lost many players to graduation, including Tabitha Malloy, Aubrey Olsen, Kelsey Friesen, Minina Apodaca and Jihea Ain, but have many talented players still on the roster. The Eagles will need to rebuild their defense as well as find a new goalie. Another notable absence is Jessica Smith, who has returned to the States for the year. However, standout players Abby Phillips, Emily Ordoñez, and Mariela Salinas will be returning, and a new class of freshmen will bring in additional young players. Veteran coach Keith Wilcke and will be in command, assisted by Melissa Kroll.
Cambridge has not been a factor in girls soccer for several years, and for the second straight year they will be starting the season with a roster that doesn’t contain a player who has scored a goal in a varsity game. Still, everyone in the League is aware of the transformation the return of Eduardo “Presi” de la Riva brought about in Cambridge’s track team performance in April, and rumor has it that the Cambridge athletic program has been entirely re-energized.
De la Riva notes he has four proven players to build a team around – goalie Carla Barriga, defender Nadia Rocco, midfielder Alejandra Abastaflor, and striker Manuela Yañez. The team may not be much of a threat in the early season, says de la Riva, but “we may pull some surprises in the playoffs.”
Boys Soccer: Who can rebuild faster; Jaguars or Griffins?
The Jaguars’ soccer championship last year capped a two-year run in which they lost only one game. (Unfortunately for the symmetry of the Jaguars’ bragging rights that game just happened to be the 2009 championship game. In that game, Cambridge, led for the last time by the already quasi-legendary Junior Sanchez, pulled off an upset 3-2 win.)
However, Cooperative has hardly been a perennial powerhouse in boys competition. Indeed, the 2010 soccer (and volleyball) championships represented the first time that the Jaguar boys had won in any varsity sport since 2006. What’s more, the Jaguars must replace the heart of last year’s team, including top scorers Jose Manuel Vasquez and Jean Andre Bretel, as well as indomitable defenders Juan Alfredo Abuawad and Federico Sauto. Santiago Paz, a rising star and one-time JV scoring champion, has left Santa Cruz. These players often so dominated the pitch last year that one felt it was unfair to the opponents.
The players the Jaguars hope to get the best out of are Hyun Kim, Juan Carlos Laguna, Lorenzo Monasterio and Eduardo Rivera, who was outstanding on junior varisty last year and will be the youngest starter on this year’s team. Although there are a lot of question marks, Coach J. C. Farel is optimistic about his team’s chances. “I feel we can compete and win as in the past,” he says.
As in the girls competition, the Jaguars most likely rivals are the Griffins, thanks to their new coach and some returning stars.
The Griffins, to be sure, also suffered some tough losses through graduation, including Andres Estenssoro, Jorge Harriague, Mauricio Nostas, and Alejandro Rios. However, Mikol Villavicencio, Santiago Maldonado, and Santiago Bedoya – all proven performers – will be back. .”We feel very confident,” said Griffin athletic director Eli Vidal. “We are solid in all categories.
Cambridge and Christian Learning are question marks at this point. Cambridge seemed to survive its first post-Junior Sanchez season last year in fairly good order, basically breaking even in the regular season 2-2-1, and taking third in the playoffs.
However, all three of the Knight victories came against Christian Learning. The two wins in the regular season were spirited contests that the Knights won by only one goal, and the victory in the playoff consolation game came by one point in a dramatic penalty shoot-out.
Moreover, the Knights lost two key players to graduation – stalwart defender Alvaro Lopez and team sparkplug Matias Martinez.
On the plus side Cambridge has several players coming up from last year’s championship JV squad incuding Victor Carmon, Herless Diaz, Marlon Castillo, and Kevin Pulis. Because Cambridge has had chronic absentee problems with its varsity over the years, these players have considerable varsity playing experience.
Christian Learning had a tough rebuilding year last year, losing all its games. However, the Eagles improved all year long, and actually came within a few minutes and a few inches of beating eventual champions Cooperative in the playoffs. Though often outmanned, they played every game with grit and determination.
Still, compounding their problems this year is the loss via graduation of Caleb Ropp, Geopyung Lim, Conroy Janzen, and forward Richard Ling. Defender Nick Smith will be in the US for the season, The team will rely on the rapid maturing of of talented freshmen Samuel Frith and Josiah Canaviri to fill the empty spaces,The outstanding returnees do include striker Andre Larsen, a potential game changer, and young-but-battle-tested sophomore goalie Wesley Ordoñez, as well as forward Trevor Reed. Long-time coach Douglas Montaño admits the team needs practice, but sees signs of promise.
Girls Varsity Volleyball: Who´ll be first among equals?
Once again, the co-favorites are Cooperative and International. In the six games the two teams have played over the past two years, each as a 3-3 record. Each has decisively beaten the other in a championship game.
But volleyball is a funny sport, where so much can depends on who has the momentum at any particular point in the season. Pundits feeling sure of their prognostications need only to think back to 2009, when Christian Learning lost all its regular season games, and then swept the championship playoff tournament.
In terms of returning starters, Cooperative might seem to have the edge. The only player from last year’s championship team who graduated is captain Aldana Roda. Sofia Sotelo, one of the key returning players, speaks with confidence about the coming season. “I´ve worked too long and too hard,” she says, “to let anything interfere with my goals. I will not let my teammates down, and I will not let myself down.” She will be setting the ball for two outstanding returning spikers – Carla Limpias and Ana Peredo. The Jaguar coach this year will be veteran Roland Cabrera, who has been training volleyball players at Cooperative since 1989. International is in similarly good shape in terms of returning players, having lost only Laura Maragano from among its key players. Back for another year of service are stars Beatrice Nallar, Maria Victoria Gutierrez, and Diana Paola Melgar.
Cambridge posted a losing 2-3 record last year, and has not figured prominently in the championship race for several years. However, opponents inclined toward overconfidence should be cautioned that the last time de la Riva was athletic director at Cambridge, the Lady Knights won two championships.
De la Riva will not be personally coaching either team, relying instead on Alberto Giraudy for the boys and Alberto Obreros for the girls, but he will serve in an active advisory capacity. While cagey in his predictions (as always), de la Riva thinks he’s got at least three strong, experienced players in Lisa Delboy, Alicia Taendler, and Laura Guillen.
Christian Learning is coming off a winless season, and while Coach Angela Belovicz is encouraged by the turnout of newer younger players it may take a few games to see how much of a threat the Eagles will be.
Boys Volleyball: Is it the Griffins turn again?
Boys volleyball is a division International used to own, and this could be then year they repossess it and avenge last year’s loss to Cooperative in the championship game. Except for promising JV player Hans Hoffman, who would have moved up to the varsity, International has virtually all of last year’s squad back, and athletic director Eli Vilar predicts that “hard training and a new atmosphere will motívate both the players and coaches.” She will share coaching duties again this year with Hugh Zaconeta.
The key players for International should include ever-steady Maykol Villavicencio, hard-serving Eric Takayama, and high-leaping Juan Sebastian Narvaez.
Cooperative will be quite a different team without its triple towers – Juan Alfredo Abuawad, Pablo Roda, and Mateus de Carvalho. But as Cooperative volleyball guru Rolando Cabrera watched this year’s team completing its tryouts, he said, “We are not as good now as we were last year, but with time we will be what we used to be and more.
“Fortunately we have a very good group of ninth graders who are in a very good level, and most of team is tenth graders, including our most valuable player, Josue Abuawad (Juan Alfredo’s “little” brother).”
Cooperative has a new coach with a distinguished record. He is Jose Luis Suarez, who is also the coach in Santa Cruz’ first división volleyball, as well as coach of the department’s younger players. He has also coached for UTEPSA.
The question then is; How long will it take for Cooperative to be as good as it was last year? Will it happen this year?
Christian Learning looked like the best team in the League last year on paper, but somehow rarely got it all together on the court, finishing 2-3 on the season. And although some key players were lost to graduation, an air of excitement and optimism has invaded the schools gyms as its teams prepare for the coming season.
Coach Angele Belovicz reported a large number of younger players turning out for both the boy and girls teams, but especially the boys team. The team, like Cooperative’s, will have a lot of ninth and tenth graders, and Coach Belovicz expects the team to improve during the year as these players become more seasoned. And the team will have at leat two outstanding returning veterans in Andre Larsen and Jesse Mann. Belovicz also said that overall she wishes to see the volleyball teams representing the school well through good sportsmanship.
Cambridge has never been a factor in boys volleyball, and hasn’t won a game in several years. Again the question will be whether the change in athletic management will change its fortunes.
(This round-up story was compiled from reports by Manuel Saavedra, Lucia Landivar, Sebastian Vedia, Nicolas Handal, Sung-Eun Song, Jesse Mann and Trevor Reed. It was written by David Boldt.)
