Eagle Report: Fall Sports Get Cracking With Victories Across the Board
Cross Country
The cross country season is starting up again, which means that Corey Gonzales, grade 11, is right back where he left off last year, setting new school records. His mark in the junior boys race at Toro Park beat his own mark at the CCS finals last year, a time that sent him to the state meet.
Tennis
In their first game of the new season, the girls won 5-2 over Santa Catalina, losing on four of the seven courts before coming back to win five second sets and the only third set tiebreaker. Dora Tzeng, grade 12, Isabelle Gross, grade 10, and Arden Hu, grade 11, all won singles matches and the teams of sophomores Stephanie Huang and Nadia Palte as well as Meghana Appalaraju, grade 11, and Era Iyer, grade 9, won doubles matches. Gross’ singles match was the high- light thriller: she lost the first set 1-6 in a blowout, but came back to win the second set before finally pulling out a dead-even third set 12-10.
Football
In the opening game, Harker varsity football blew out the Faith Christian Warriors 41-0 in Coalinga. Defense back Samir Chaudhry, grade 12, had two pivotal interceptions in the shut- out. Running back Kevin Moss, grade 12, ran for two touchdowns and kicker Alyssa Amick, grade 11, racked up 11 points. Chaudhry, Adarsh Battu, grade 12, and Sid Krishnamurthi, grade 11, also scored touchdowns.
Girls Volleyball
Both girls junior varsity and varsity teams won their season openers against the West Catholic League’s Notre Dame-Belmont in straight games. For the varsity, Shannon Richardson, grade 10, had 12 kills; Divya Kalidindi, grade 12, had 11; and Shreya Dixit, grade 11, had 10.
Water Polo
Juniors Billy Bloomquist and Eric Holt racked up seven goals apiece in early play at the Wilcox Tournament, where Harker’s varsity team defeated league rival Santa Clara on their way to a 1-2 tournament. JV also went 1-2 at the San Benito Tournament in early September.
Summer Sports
Summer’s ending, and that means athletes will be leaping into the fall season soon! But even during the time away from school, Harker’s sportsmen and sportswomen have been training, winning and earning honors. Harker has individual students snatching
up medals, teams being recognized for academic achievement, coaches winning awards, and alumni joining university teams. To the update!
Basketball
Harker athletes competed in and won the Varsity Summer League at Evergreen Valley High School. The team finished the regular season of the summer league second in their division, losing only one game to a team that finished with an undefeated record. In the playoffs, Harker defeated the third-seated team in the other division, moving on to face an undefeated team from the other division at Evergreen, beating them by six points after taking the lead in the final minutes. That pushed Harker into the championship game, where Harker won by a large margin.
The summer league represents an opportunity for players to work on individual skills but grow as a team, as well as for rising players to step up and prove themselves going into the following year.
Soccer
A hearty congratulations is in order for the boys soccer team, who posted the highest GPA of any high school male soccer team in California. This August, the California Interscholastic Federation, which was founded nearly a century ago in 1914, announced its 2012-13 state academic team champions, an honor bestowed upon teams with the highest overall grade point average in each sport.
For the victory, the California Interscholastic Federation will bestow upon Harker a banner, which Harker can display in a gym or other prominent space. Boys soccer finished their 2013 season with a 7-8-2 record overall and a 5-7-2 record in league play, landing them with a fourth-place overall finish.
While Harker’s athletes were being re- warded for their academic achievement, varsity coach Shaun Tsakiris gained some recognition as well. In July, U.S. Soccer’s Development Academy voted Tsakiris national coach of the year.
In alumni news, Siobhan Cox ’13 has already started playing for Stanford! So far, she’s started two out of three games and has an assist. Stanford is off to a 2-0-1 start.
Football
Indraneel “Neel” Salukhe ’12 will be playing football for the University of Washington in Seattle this year. Salukhe played football all four years at Harker. A wide receiver, he walked on for spring football last season and was invited to join the regular football camp to train with and play for U.W.