Not all the fireworks at Jay Will Stadium Friday night were provided by the teams on the field, but Shemar Savage did provide a few for the Braves.
NSBCART
There was a pretty sparse gathering on Monday for the Northern Santa Barbara County Athletic Round Table. The weekly convocation held at Giavanni's Pizza and Pasta in Orcutt, still had good pizza, better bread, and some top-notch athletes.
Athletes of the Week
Shemar Savage, Lompoc HS, Football
Shemar also had a stellar game at CB. He provided excellent coverage of opposing receivers, made 8 solo tackles, and did very well at maintaining leverage to prevent runners from getting outside. He has been an integral part of a Brave defense that last allowed a TD on September 2nd.
Female Athlete of the Week
Mary Kavaloski, Santa Ynez VUHS, Girls Tennis
[Was not able to attend the Luncheon]
Master of Ceremonies: Charles Sommer, KTNK
It even affected her trip to the grocery store. "People were stopping and saying - 'Oh, Joni, it was so wonderful. Our kids loved it! They got to actually see real football players!' You would have thought the Los Angeles Rams or somebody showed up. So thank you!."
Sommer later amended that to the Oakland Raiders, since 'they're playing a little bit better" than the Rams.
Righetti
Head Coach: Ed Herrmann
The Warriors concluded PAC-8 League play last week, closing out a rough 3 game stretch of Paso Robles, Arroyo Grande, and Atascadero. Against the Greyhounds, "We got into a hole early, but we showed a little grit and a little character, and kinda kept after it, and we outscored them in the second half - 20 to 6. They didn't sub a whole lot, we just kinda flipped the script, got some onside kicks, and got some nice plays going. It was a good way to end that murderers row, score some points, and make some positive things happen."
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| Bakke (Standing), Artopoeus (White shirt), Leon (in cap) |
Nathan Bakke (Jr) OL/DL
"So, Nathan, offensive and defensive line, hardly misses a snap. It's tough to get him off the field. He's just kind of a worker for us, and we expect big things from him."
Julian Leon (Jr) WR/DB
"Julian is a wide receiver/defensive back for us. He leads our team in receptions. Another worker, just kinda head down, mouth shut, straight ahead, real intelligent football player. He's been a real pleasure for us to have this year."
Chase Artopoeus (So) QB
As a sophomore on varsity the staff have brought him along slowly, but the other night they decided to give him a shot. He responded coming off the bench. "He ran for a touchdown, threw a touchdown, and he got a couple of those drives started for us. We're looking for some really big things from Chase next year."
Righetti concludes their season this Friday with 'The Battle of the Helmet' against cross-town rival Pioneer Valley. "We look forward to the challenge, and hopefully we can finish on a high note."
St. Joseph
Director of Athletics: Tom Mott
Football
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| Tullos, Morris |
Christian Tullos (Sr)
Christian comes from an Air Force family - they just moved out here this year from back in Virginia - and he's done a great job on the defensive line for us. Just a no nonsense guy, 4.0 GPA, just a great addition to our school."
Zach Morris (Jr)
"Zack's a junior, plays linebacker for us. Had a solid game against Lompoc on Friday, and has just done a good job. He also plays baseball and soccer."
He finished with a few words about the Knights prior and upcoming games - "Congrats to Lompoc. Great Team, great season, we hope you keep on winning. Santa Ynez looks like they're home preparing for us Friday night. Big game for second place for us. Best of luck for everybody the rest of the way."
Valley Christian
Athletic Director: Pete Fortier
Football
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| Rohde, Anderson, Valadez |
"I was gonna give the guys the week off, the rest of the season off, but they decided they wanted to play a Blue & Gold [scrimmage] game, in the rain, on Thursday. They had a great time, the coaches not-so-much, but it was fun to watch. They really enjoyed it."
He then introduced Joey Valadez (Jr) who "plays center for us" and a "couple of freshmen that are going to help us out greatly next year" - Conner Anderson (Fr) & A.J. Rohde (Fr). "We do lose 4 seniors, I brought them last week, but we're looking forward to the future of VCA football. We're looking really good for next year."
Lompoc
Former Athletic Director: Dick Barrett
Football
Head Coach: Andrew Jones
Coach Jones started things off for the Braves - "I just want to thank the Roundtable for continuing to do this. I remember coming here as a player at Lompoc and then when I went to Hancock. I remember Trevor Shamley and I would come here every Monday to give the update on Hancock football."
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| Taua, Savage, Cortez |
"We had a tough match-up on Friday
with St. Joseph - extremely well coached football team. They've got one of the better defenses in the area and they gave us some fits, and gave us a big fight."
"In a Championship type atmosphere, the team that makes less mistakes usually comes out on top. We were able to score on special teams, and create two turnovers, and that was really the difference."
"Any time you've got a guy like CJ Cole on their offense; to limit them to 3 points is huge. So our defense - defense really does win championships - really came through in that game."
He introduced "three guys that rally play on both sides of the ball - #35 Toa Taua (Jr), #21 Ruben Cortez, and #22 Shemar Savage. He came up big for us on defense and he's the guy who had the kick return. We've kind of moved on, and we're off to The Big Game versus Cabrillo this week."
Cross Country
Coach Barrett was the next Brave at the mic, talking about two of the XC meets the Braves are hosting this season - the Jim Warrick Santa Barbara County Championships last Thursday and the LPL Finals this coming Wednesday. He began by complementing Charles for his Holloween "get-up as Napoleon Dynamite."
"They should call it the marathon because by the time it took to run all the races they could have run a marathon. The good news is the participation of so many kids - they include JV's now and boys frosh /soph. By the time the boys varsity started at 4:30, the rain started sideways and the wind - ugh, it was really a mess out there."
"Our guy, Isaac Acosta, in the rain, finished 4th. He ran a 15:47, which I think is pretty good. The three guys that beat him were studs, and I don't think he has run against them before, he may have run against one of them. The guy from DP that won it, and then a guy from Cate, and then a kid from Righetti - Sean Morley, these are all big, physical guys and they just plowed through the rain. It was fun to watch - it wasn't fun to be out there in the rain, but those kids ran hard."
"We are hosting the league meet on Wednesday at River Park at two o'clock. We'll see how long that one takes, and if that rains.Water Polo
"We also have the Water Polo Championships coming up this week. We only had a couple kids back from last year, so it wasn't a great year for us. We played Cabrillo the other day, and hung in there the first half, but got beat pretty good by them. They're a good team too, so we'll see how that goes."
He finished with a few comments about football and the Lompoc-Cabrillo rivalry. "And then obviously football is the focus with The Big Game against Cabrillo. I know we have great rivalries here, St Joe and Righetti right across the street, but there's no greater rivalry than Lompoc-Cabrillo. I'm not saying it's better, but it gets a little crazy in this town. So it should be pretty fun, because it doesn't matter what the records are - there have been upsets before - the whole town gets behind it."
"I remember my first year coaching. Coming to Lompoc. We didn't do very well in the (pre)season, we played Atascadero, South Bakersfield, Westlake - all these good teams, we were, like, 2-3. But then we won the league, so I'm pretty excited. Then the principal at the time, Bob Paisola, comes up to me and says - 'You know it doesn't mean anything - Ya got Cabrillo this week.' So that kind of tells you how it's looked at by many people in the community. It should be a lot of fun. Good luck to everybody this week in all your athletic stuff."Orcutt Academy
Athletic Director: Chad McKenzie
Coach Art Lopez discussed his Tennis squad before turning AD McKenzie loose to talk about football.
Girls Tennis
Head Coach: Art Lopez
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| Megan Vise', Sarah Lopez, Keona Pablo |
"The last three years it's basically come down to Santa Ynez, Cabrillo, and us. And this year I'm glad to say that the girls really pulled it through, at the end of the season, really finished off strong. We came in first place, a 13-1 record, and now we're getting ready to start our second season. We will be playing on Wednesday against the winner of Mission Prep and Ventura. Hopefully we'll have a very successful second half of the season."
Football
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| Sutton, Luna-Vasquez |
Ben Luna-Vasquez. "He's a sophomore and starts at linebacker. He had 14 solo tackles, and was in on a lot of other tackles."
Jarod Sutton (Jr)
Jarrod was big on the offensive side - and the defensive side. 168 yards rushing and a touchdown against a very tough defense. He had a lot of great open field tackles playing safety for us right now. He comes in and fills. If you miss a tackle in 8-man football there's a lot of room to run. He (rates ?) it up well and ensures that they only get 4 or 5 yards, instead of 15 or 20. So He did a good job."
"So we are 5-4 overall, 2-2 in league. And we found out we play Chadwick, at Chadwick, Saturday at 2pm for the playoffs. They're really good, they are a fast team. We beat them earlier in the year, but we've had some injuries. We're making some adjustments. We plan on it being a close game, and hopefully we'll pull that one off - I know the guys are excited."
Hancock
[Athletic Director: Kim Ensing]
Football
Offensive Co-ordinator: Seth Damron
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| Alex Cecchi |
"We had a nice win against an LA Pierce team that was really struggling, we put it on them pretty good. The defense played extremely well, getting their first shutout of the year, which was great, and we put up a lot of points because of it."
Coach Damron brought
Alex Cecchi (Arroyo Grande)
"I'm sure a lot of you guys are familiar with Alex. He played at AG and gave some people fits around here for a long time. Now he has come with us, and he has been doing a great job for us at receiver, playing the slot for us a lot this year. We've had a lot of injuries, so Alex has been repping with us at running back, but this week was his first time getting a lot of carries. He was really our featured back this week and ended up having 130, 140 yards and rushed for 3 touchdowns. He did a really nice job, and obviously he'd say that the O-line blocked well for him. Right, Alex?"
"We got our last home game coming up against Antelope Valley, and Antelope Valley has playing really well. They've got a heck of a quarterback, whose been giving people fits. Defensively they've playing well too. We're going to have our work cut out for us, hopefully we can string a couple of wins together here to finish the season. If any of you are interested in coming out, lets us know, we'ed love to get you on the sideline."
Regular Attendee Schools Not Represented at the Luncheon this Week:
Cabrillo
Santa Ynez
Santa Maria
Pioneer Valley
The Drawing: was won by Keona Pablo of Orcutt Academy Tennis.
Others
NSBCART Staff
President - Joni Grey
Treasurer - Yvonne Biely
Photographer - Elidia Morales
Media Members:
Charles Sommer, KTNK Radio
Jason Orr, KSBY TV
Dave Alley, KEYT/KCOY/Fox11 TV
Mike Loney, KPEG/TAP-TV/LLR
Elliot Stern, Sports Editor, Lee Central Coast Newspapers
Mike McCoy, Santa Barbara News-Press
