Game of the Month: Varsity Basketball vs Westmont

Senior Chelsea Punian began the game against the Westmont Warriors with the tip off, knocking the ball away from the opposing player, but the Warriors gained possesion of the ball scoring the first point of the game.

The Panthers quickly took control of the ball and passed it down the court and the game began. Getting to the game, the score was Panthers 10- Warriors 5. The Panthers rapidly passed the ball back and forth between  seniors Nici Gilday, Stephanie Rechenmacher, sophomore Courtney Danna and freshman Joeseta Fatuesi until on a two point shot by the Panthers, Danna was fouled by a Warrior while attempting a lay-up. Danna took two foul shots from the top of the key and made both altering the score to 12-9 Panthers.

The Warriors took possession of the ball, only to drop it between passes and Fatuesi snatched it away passing to Gilday and the rest of the team. Passing and scoring commenced for the rest of the first quarter with 30.7 seconds left on the clock, the Panthers possessed the ball after a change of possesion via a passing offensive foul and Gilday made a huge three-pointer. But the Warriors took the ball with seconds to go and their number 30 made a three-pointer that ended the quarter with a tied score of 14-14.

The second quarter commenced similarly to the first but with the Panthers always having the lead. The Warriors always seemed to have the ball but the Panthers time after time stole possession and made the baskets. With 4:27 left in the second quarter, the Westmont coach called time out. The Warriors brought the ball back into play with a hard pass to another player who missed the ball, leaving junior Amanda Dung to swoop in dribbling the ball down and passing it off to Gilday and Fatuesi with Gilday attempting a shot but on the rebound a Warrior claimed the ball. She travels and Dung throws the ball in from the side lines continuing the game until the Warriors had the ball, but out of nowhere senior Molly Pearson glides in, snatching the ball and completing a lay-up.

The whistle calls for half time with the score Panthers 32, Warriors 25. Both teams leave to go to the locker room and return after the one minute warning bell sounds.

New players are substituted in for the 3rd quarter with speedy passes and points scored by both teams. At 2:35 seconds left in the quarter, some close calls occurred where the Warriors had possession, lost it to the Panthers. The Panthers lost the ball but Punian quickly recovered to score the point.  The accuracy of three point shots from the Panthers was amazing as was the speed with which the players passed the ball back and forth between each other. The fourth  quarter continued similarly to the first three with the Panthers continuing to hold control over the game to the dismay of the Warriors. Their coach called time out with minutes left in the game while the Panthers ran smiling to their end of the court.

With seconds left in the game, the opponent had possession of the ball but missed the pass and Rechenmacher and Dung navigate towards the hoop and Rechenmacher completes the lay-up just as the whistle sounds ending the game 67-41.

The Panthers, following winning CCS Semi-Finals, went up against the Monarchs (Mitty) on March fourth at Santa Clara University. The game was a nail-bitter because the team’s scores were neck-in-neck until the end where the Panthers won 44-41 becoming WCAl and CCS Division II champions for 2011. Great job Panthers!

February Game of the Month: Presentation vs. Sacred Heart

Presentation’s varsity soccer team dominated against the Irish (Sacred Heart) on Jan. 29 finishing the game 4-1. The game showed the young team’s potential for the upcoming WCAL tournament and CCS.

Sacred Heart started off with the ball, but junior Maire Rooney quickly took to dominating the center field and feeding balls wide to junior Megan McArthur. After a few ping pong minutes in the beginning, plays started developing in the back.

Defense was on point with junior Rachel Ometer controlling the back in the sweeper position, clearing everything in sight. Freshman Sarah Lipscomb raised the game’s energy by flying past an Irish and feeding the ball to Rooney who took a strong shot on goal, where it bounced off the crossbar. Freshman Maile Washington came hard to follow, planting the ball in the top right corner. 1-0 Panthers.

With some shots on goal and brilliant saves by captain senior Jennifer Randazzo, the half ended with Ometer and defender junior Julia Schon attacking two opponents at the top of the box and both ended on the ground, later having to leave the field, but the Panthers’ defense line held up.

The second half started with a quick shot by Rooney while McArthur and Washington kept following. Juniors Stephanie Maniglia and MC Guidoux stepped up in the wing and midfield position to get some strong shots off as well.

Fouls started flying until Ometer had one in the box, creating the opportunity for the Irish to score through a penalty kick. Randazzo almost had the stop, but it redirected into the goal off her feet. With the score 1-1 with 26 minutes left, the Panthers started crashing the goal.

Three minutes later, after Sacred Heart’s goalie failed with a punt, Lipscomb took a quick look and fired from almost midfield, flying over the goalie’s head into goal, making the game 2-1. Three minutes after that, Guidoux attacked through the defense and Maniglia came from behind and placed the ball over the goalie’s head again.

Without laying off the defensive pressure, with 16 minutes left, McArthur took a quick throw-in to the top of the box where Guidoux was ready to fire, nailing the ball into the back of the net.

Confident in their position, Randazzo went out in exchange for senior Andrea Tomlinson at goal. Finishing the game with heads held high, the Panthers walked proudly off the field with smiles of jobs well done. Check them out at their next game this Saturday, Feb. 5 at Presentation at 11 a.m. against Notre Dame Belmont.

Player Profile: Sheila Murray

The Voice took a splash into the life of senior Sheila Murray, who has been swimming on the Presentation team for all four years.  She has the top five fastest time for the 50 butterfly junior varsity.
The Voice: When did you start swimming?
SM: I learned how to swim when I was 4 years old. And then I swam in my cabana club every summer until I was about in fifth grade. When Pres swimming started, I started becoming involved with swimming again. Up until junior year, it was Pres swimming in the fall. And then junior year I decided to join Sunnyvale club team and I swam that for a year from September to February when Pres started again. And then this past season at Pres.
The Voice: So you started when you were four years old—was there a reason why you started so early?
SM:I learned how to swim at four years old. But, five years old is when I started to do strokes. At that age, at cabana club, you’re basically swimming a lap—that’s your race.
The Voice: What do you like most about swimming?
SM: You feel amazing after a really good workout at swimming; you get a really good workout. I love when you put in so much effort to swim and you knock off time at meets. That is definitely amazing. It’s a great feeling—the amount of strength and athletic ability it gives you.
The Voice: Do you plan on swimming for college?
SM: Yeah, I’m hopefully going to be joining the club team at Purdue. Hopefully, I’ll be swimming year round because I really enjoy it.
The Voice: Is there anyone who motivates you? Your parents? Coach?
SM: Yeah, I have a best friend and we’ve been best friends since freshman year, her name’s Claire. And we’ve both really pushed each other to do better. We both swim different strokes though. She swims breast stroke and I swim fly. We definitely motivate each other to knock off time because both of us are stuck at this time, where we can’t break any more seconds off. She definitely motivates me to swim better.

The Voice: Is there a competition or experience that sticks out to you the most?
SM: Every time that you hit the wall and you realize “Oh I knocked off time” that’s a really great feeling. Last year, I swam the 50 fly and literally could not break 30 seconds. It was so frustrating because you train so hard and you can’t break that—the 30 is like the border—and we went off to Valley Christian and we had a meet. I went up to the race and I was like “Okay whatever. I don’t think I’m going to break 30 because I haven’t done it yet.” And I hit that wall and I turned around and I saw Marissa on the wall and she’s like “YEAAHH! You did it!” And I turn around and I saw my 29 96 and it was amazing! And I did the whole like “YESSS!” It was like, finally, it happened! And it wasn’t one of those moments when you were like “I’m gonna do this. I’m gonna do this.” I just kinda went in like relaxed and I was gonna try to do it my best. But it finally happened. Oh my gosh it was amazing.
The Voice: You do the butterfly stroke. Is it your favorite? Or are you the best at that stroke?
SM: I do it every day at practice.  It’s really difficult when you do a lot of it because it definitely takes a lot of energy out of you. Being able to swim it and being able to do it with the amount of power it takes definitely makes it worth it. When you’re swimming against everyone else in the team and the next think you know there’s no one next to you. It’s nice. I enjoy doing it.
The Voice: Is there a figure you look up to for swimming or just life, in general?
SM: My sister. She tried really hard at Pres and got into a really good school. She’s always been really good at water polo.  And I guess I just love her a lot.

Track Overview

As the track and field team changes every year, one thing stays the same: the Presentation Panthers have always done what they could with the small number of people available. They finished this season with a well deserved 3-3-0 record below the top three of Archbishop Mitty, Saint Francis, and Saint Ignatius, respectively.
With a tough season that featured many injuries, the long distance section of the Panther’s team still came out undefeated. Although the sprinting section did not finish off as well, junior Allison Bajet, whose best time in the 100-meter is 12.9 seconds, said,
“The individual races within the team really help build confidence because usually, when someone goes into a race thinking they are going to win and they lose, they can’t get out of the mental downspin. I like that little competition within the team. The races really help you learn that while you lose a few, you win a few. Your teammates make you go faster and strive to become better.” Bajet took part in many of the relays for Varsity this year, improving considerably since the first practice after coming out of her junior varsity soccer.
With all of the help this year from seven coaches and the volunteer coach for pole vaults, the athletes kept their heads ups with the wins and losses. Still, according to Coach Chris Cozort, consistent attendance at practices and meets remained a challenge.  “Mr. Cooling encourages athletes to participate in multiple sports at Pres, which helps our programs by spreading the school’s athletic ability around to multiple teams,” said Cozort, who will be leaving Presentation at the end of the year to work at Bellarmine. “Many athletes unfortunately choose to participate in club sports outside of Pres which has a generally negative impact on school sports participation.”
Overall, the team had a good year with many personal bests and young freshmen and sophomores making a difference. With this said, next year is expected to break new heights. With the size of Presentation, it is tricky to form a strong team overall, but Cozort believes we can do it. “We want the caliber team, which is easier to find in a bigger group of students, but we’ve assembled some great, strong, quick runners even with endurance. There will be a young team out there next year.”

Game of the Month: Varsity Softball vs. Mitty

With the seniors equipped to play their final home game, the Panthers went head to head with the Monarchs. The last season game before WCALs for softball ended 1-0 with Mitty stealing the only run of the game due to bad communication. After Mitty’s sneaky steal, the game’s energy kept rising all the way until the final seventh inning.
After the announcements of our beloved seniors, the starting lineup took to the field with JT Wozniak as catcher, Kayla Bose on first, Kendra Meadows on second, Karina Schneider covering shortstop, Briana Fujii on third and Raquel Rinauro taking to the pitcher’s mound.
The Panthers were the first to take the field. Rinauro rallied up two strike-outs as well as taking a grounder to the glove in order to pass to Bose on first to keep Mitty contained to their dugout. By the end of the 1st inning, the game was close at 0-0.
By the second inning, Briana Fujii made a stand out catch for the third out, one of many key plays that came. Kayla Bose was up to bat and made contact with the ball, hitting the softball to right field, rounding first and heading for second. She was caught up in a pickle between first and second and almost escaped the reaching hand of Mitty’s second baseman. Meadows was the second out almost making it to first, and Pizarro supplied Mitty with their third out to go into the third inning.
Mitty, known for stealing bases, found a way around the bases from a single. Running into home, Wozniak almost tagged her as the Monarch slid past, not even touching the base. As Rinauro and Wozniak went for a pep talk, Mitty went to touch the plate, scoring the only run of the game. “I was upset when I first realized that JT didn’t make the tag, but I knew the game wasn’t over yet and we still had a chance,” said senior Raquel Rinauro.
Krista Jensen caught a fly from right field and Schneider tagged a runner at second, changing the energy of the game. From that point, the Panthers kept trying to fight back with Fujii making three solid outs and Larissa Rinauro making the play of the game with a sliding catch at second, keeping Mitty away from home and scoring position. All Presentation could get were foul balls. Raquel Rinauro commented after the game, “Overall, the game went really well. We just couldn’t capitalize on their errors.” Players of the game include Briana Fujii and Karina Schneider. The Panthers will go to their CCS tournament this upcoming week.

February Game of the Month: Varsity Soccer vs. Saint Ignatius

Presentation varsity soccer faced off against Saint Ignatius on Friday, January 22 and gained a major 2-0 win. The team is now ranked 5th in CCS this season.
The game started at 3:20 p.m. after the teams both warmed up and put their game faces on. Seniors Michelle Kay and  Taylor Johnson started the kickoff. In the first 10 minutes, senior Shelby Galaviz continually attacked the ball even when the ball was mostly in the defensive end. Junior Jennifer Randazzo, the star goalie of the varsity team, kept everything out of the box with her punts passing over half the field.
Michelle Kay’s headers and Julia Shon’s throw-ins teamed up to start the attack towards St. Ignatius’ goalbox. Sixteen minutes into the half, Megan Mccarthur scored off of a rebound right over the goalie’s head giving Presentation a 1-0 lead.
Eight minutes later, St. Ignatius had a close call off of a corner kick, but Jennifer Randazzo gobbled up the soccer ball once again. After this moment, the momentum shifted into a major offensive attack for the Panthers.
With two minutes left of the first half, Taylor Johnson took the corner kick that landed right in the box where Maire Rooney ripped a shot from the top of the six-yard line, landing in the back of the top right corner of the goal. This ended the half with the Panthers up 2-0.
The second half began and, after 11 minutes, sophomore Megan Mccarthur went down with a kick to the side of her shin, taking her out for the rest of the game. When asked how she was doing, she commented, “I’m on Motrin right now, but I’ll be fine!” Sophomore Rachel Ometer went down later near the end of the game after she collided with last month’s athlete of the month, senior Emma Caringello, for a header. She is recovering well now, too. Ometer commented, “I am out with a concussion at the moment. But I will not give up, and I will keep supporting my team.”
For the last 30 minutes of the game, arms were flailing and fouls were being handed out right and left, but the Panthers dominated and kept SI out of their box. The game finished with the score of 2-0. Junior Aneska Alino after the win said, “It was amazing! We worked so hard to keep our title for first place.”

Game of December: Varsity Basketball

The Panther’s Varsity Basketball team took on the Evergreen High School Cougars on December 8, 2009, and came out with a strong win of 76-43 by the end of the night, making their league count 2-0-0.

Nici Gilday, a guard who has been on the Presentation Varsity team since her freshman year, was proud of the game and the outcome. “The second half really picked up. What it all really comes down to is that we are a lot more disciplined than all the other teams we have been playing. We keep fighting until the end.”

As the team started every home game, senior Savanna Morgan led the team out of the gym foyer of Presentation High School by jumping up and hitting the sign of hope written on the gym wall. It says ‘Hard Work + Determination = CHAMPION.’ When Gilday was asked why the team did such a ritual, she commented, “We started that last year, and we hit it because it is a true testimony of what we believe. A creed, really.”

The starting lineup strutted onto the court, confident with their size and skill. Molly Pearson towered over Evergreen’s center for the tip-off, taking the ball for Presentation for the start of the game. Within the first couple of plays, the Panther’s energy shone, although shots were falling short and no shots made it in the basket. By the six minute mark, the only score on the board was 1-0 from a foul shot. Soon after, Gilday put up a shot from a breakaway, making the score 3-0. Evergreen kept fighting, but by the end of the first quarter, Presentation still came out on top.

The second quarter consisted of a lot of fouls and baskets. At the end of the half, the score was 34-15. The crowd was happy with the first half, but left room for improvement. One person in the crowd, Taylor Johnson, said, “I love going to support my friends on the team, and it’s a good feeling when your team does better because they know you are there supporting them. The second half had so much more energy in the air.”

The foul list for the home team reached up to 19 team fouls by the end of the night, showing their aggression and desire to win the game at any cost. Forward Chelsea Punian’s aggression tallied up four fouls. Cooling was very happy with the speed of the game, and how the team has been doing this season. “Our team is just winning everything in dominating fashion.” With the crowd’s support, who wouldn’t want to show their panther pride?

Credit for the win not only goes to the Varsity Basketball team, but also to the coaches, Wade Nakamura and Adam Blightman. Assistant Athletic Director Stacey Mallison, who was there to support her team, found the game exciting and was proud to see their success. “So far this season, everything looks good. There is a lot of potential and talent out on that court,” she said. “The game showed me that their speed of play has increased exponentially.”

Congratulations to the mighty strong basketball team, for not only did they defeat Evergreen, but they won the Pinewood Classic Tournament, winning the championship game 50-33. This leaves their current record at 5-0-0. The whole school is waiting to see how the Varsity Basketball team will do the rest of the season! After Christmas break, check out the following games: Valley Christian at Presentation on Wednesday January 6, 2010 at 7:30 pm AND Archbishop Mitty at Presentation on Wednesday January 13, 2010 at 7:30 pm.

November Game of the Month: Varsity Volleyball

On October 29, a row of four proud Presentation athletes stood in front of a raging crowd. The rest of their teammates stood behind them, cheering for them and congratulating them for their final home game at Presentation High School. The four seniors, Claire Hansen, Sarah Blach, Motade Atanda, and Stephanie Dvorak, were excited for their last volleyball game. The opposing team, Saint Ignatius, mentally prepared themselves for what they knew would be a hard game.
Senior Night, a tradition for volleyball as Pres, is a game that draws many viewers and really represents our school pride. Usually, all the members of the seniors’ families attend this game to see their girls’ final moment on the volleyball court. Traditionally, the rest of the team makes signs for the seniors and hang them on the walls for all to see. The seniors receive flowers and a special presentation from the announcer.
After these festivities were over, the girls got ready to start their game. Starting off strong, Presentation attacked SI with kill after kill. Atanda played a key role with plenty of sturdy blocks, shoving the ball back down onto SI’s side of the court. Pres won the first game quickly and easily, 25 to 16.
The second game was also quite successful and had plenty of exciting moments. Hansen and Blach were on their game and were hitting spectacularly. Blach, an outside hitter, slammed the balls down at SI fiercely. Her serves were also very strong and resulted in a lot of aces. Hansen, a right side hitter, crushed balls into the corner of the court. These hits almost always hit the floor on SI’s side of the court. Though they were working hard, SI’s frustration was apparent by the time they lost the second game 25 to 15. Presentation’s spirits were up as they entered the third game with a lot of confidence.
The third game surely made Pres girls proud. All of the girls were working as hard as they could, even with the advantage against Saint Ignatius. Dvorak, a libero, was also playing very well. She was on her toes and ready to dig any ball hit at her. Whenever SI would try to trick the defense and tip the ball instead of hit it, Pres’ defense was there to pick it up and make a kill out of it. Nothing could get past the Presentation defense. Every girl on the team also had very consistent serves. With around half the team jump serving, balls were being fired at SI. There were not many serves that did not make it over the net or went out of bounds. This third game was won 25 to 14.
All in all, Presentation performed very well against Saint Ignatius. The girls worked together as a team and truly made the spectators proud. Coach Cooling, excited about the win, stated “It was an amazing game. We couldn’t have played any better. The seniors were phenomenal. The game was a must-win for us and we dominated from beginning to end.” The team is now competing in CCS; best luck to them and go Panthers!