THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 19, 1994 TAG: 9406190148
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C12 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PAUL WHITE, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: 940619 LENGTH: Long
South Hampton Roads teams won seven Group AAA state team championships, three more than the year before.
{REST} They also made their usual splash on the national scene.
Norcom's football team was ranked 15th by USA Today and Norfolk Academy's girls' soccer team was ranked 14th by Umbro.
Individually, Wilson's Latasha Colander and Salem's Charles Reid posted the best times in the nation in the 100-meter and the 110-meter hurdles, respectively.
Western Branch's Jimmy Anderson struck out 22 batters in one game and was drafted by the Pittsburgh Pirates.
All in all it was a year worth replaying. So here goes.
SUPER TEAMS
Although Salem's girls basketball team was ranked No. 1 in the area throughout the regular season, losses in the Beach District tournament and Eastern Region finals raised questions about the Sun Devils' state championship timbre. But Beach tournament champion Kempsville didn't make it out of the region, and region winner Menchville crumbled in a first-round state tournament game to Midlothian. When the ball finally stopped bouncing, multi-sport star Kelly Bradley and the rest of the talented, resourceful Sun Devils were the ones still standing.
In boys basketball, Booker T. Washington and Indian River staged the best game, a 99-98 humdinger that would put any chapter of this year's NBA Finals to shame. But best team honors belonged to Churchland, which, led by All-Tidewater juniors D.J. Dunbar and Marvin Rodgers, put on three scintillating performances on its own floor to win its first Eastern Region championship.
Freshmen Brooke Sawyer and Michelle Alexander led Kellam to the state gymnastics tournament, but it was the inspiring performance of senior Lisa Binetti that put the Knights over the top.
Despite dislocating her kneecap so badly she had to be carried from the competition area, Binetti hobbled back to the uneven bars and performed a 9.2 routine, just the emotional lift the Knights needed to hold off the competition. Movies have been made about less.
Cox opened and closed its boys soccer season with matching 4-0 defeats to two-time state champion Hylton. In between the losses, however, the Falcons were supreme. With state player of the year Matt Whalen leading the way, the Falcons ran away with what was supposed to be a tight Beach District race.
Great Bridge accounted for three state team titles, and the Wildcats won them all convincingly. In golf, Great Bridge captured its second title in three years by a whopping 32 strokes. And in wrestling, the Wildcats rolled to their third straight team and seventh individual title, a victory made all the more impressive since they did it without crowning one individual champion.
Speaking of dynasties, the Cox field hockey program checked in with its fifth straight state title. So dominating are the Falcons that the biggest news of the season came when surprising Green Run snapped Cox's 58-game winning streak. The Falcons took defeat so personally they exacted revenge three times - in the Beach District, region and state finals.
All Norfolk Academy's girls soccer team did was run its record to 126-0-1 against TCIS opponents, hold league opponents scoreless for the second straight year and capture its ninth straight league title.
The only reason the powerful Norfolk Academy boys lacrosse team doesn't post similar numbers is the Bulldogs don't play in the TCIS, opting instead to seek out the best competition the state can offer. Maybe the Bulldogs should try another state - the team is 33-2 over the past two years and has won two straight Virginia Prep League titles.
For dominance in a revenue-producing sport, however, no one could touch Norcom's football team. Buoyed by an unyielding defense - nine shutouts in 14 games - the Greyhounds rolled through the regular season unbeaten, then waxed four playoff opponents by a combined score of 109-16 to capture the Group AAA, Division 5 title.
SUPER STARS The name of the school changed - from Manor to Wilson - but Latasha Colander's performance remained the same - Three events, three state track titles. She finishes her high school career with 12 Group AAA gold medals. Next stop for the Colander Express: the University of North Carolina. Salem's Charles Reid turned in a Colander-caliber performance on the boys side, as he picked up two state titles, including the nation's fastest time by a high-schooler in the 110 hurdles.
With one 19-yard burst on the final play of Norcom's 22-0 victory over Deep Creek, running back Terry Ricks moved past former Cox star Lamonte Still and into the top spot on South Hampton Roads' all-time regular-season rushing list. Ricks wound up with 4,085 yards (Still finished with 3,913) and also scored 52 touchdowns. He then signed to play at Hampton, where he will join Still in the Pirate backfield.
Never mind watching a no-hitter. Fans showed up when Western Branch's Jimmy Anderson was on the mound because of the very real possibility he might strike everybody out. The senior lefthander struck out 139 hitters in just 65 innings and ran his career winning streak to 20 decisions before losing to Clover Hill in the state quarterfinals.
South Hampton Roads got its usual bounty of state titles at the state wrestling championships, as Salem's Chip Reyes (103 pounds) and Jun Blancaflor (112), Western Branch's Chris Viola (119), Indian River's Norman Smith (130) and Cox's Brian Wilson (275) emerged victorious. Viola later placed second at the National High School Championships - matching the best placing ever by an area wrestler - before signing to wrestle for Big Ten power Michigan.
For the second year in a row, the width of a balance beam separated Bayside's Liane Williams from a state all-around gymnastics title. Williams fell off the apparatus for the second straight year, wiping out her all-around bid. All was not lost, however, as the sophomore still finished first in the floor exercise and tied for first on uneven bars and vaulting.
Finally, Maury's Conlin Giles nipped Great Bridge's Kennis Sigmon by a stroke to win the Group AAA golf title.
SUPER SPORTS Teams and athletes win titles all the time, but as the pressure to win increases, instances of true sportsmanship sadly appear headed toward extinction. That's why no recap of the year in high school sports would be complete without acknowledging the efforts of:
Bayside's Carolyn Zanelli, who stopped in the middle of a race to help a fallen runner;
Great Bridge golfer Alton Todd, who confessed to signing an incorrect scorecard at the Eastern Region tournament, even though it nearly cost the Wildcats a berth in the state championships;
Jason Lewis, who forfeited rather than take an injury default which would have eliminated Tallwood's Jonathan Vann from the Eastern Region wrestling tournament.
The actions of these athletes stands in stark contrast to the display put on by Episcopal boys basketball coach Fred Brown, who pulled his team off the court in a state playoff game against Teagle Christian in a dispute over officiating. Brown forfeited despite his team holding an 11-point lead with under five minutes remaining and a 20-8 lead in free-throw attempts.
``One headmaster there said if he (Brown) was coaching for him, he'd fire'' Brown, said Thomas C. Whitworth, headmaster of host Flint Hill Academy. ``I agree with him.
NOTABLE NOTES: Boys and girls volleyball debuted as fall sports in the Beach and Southeastern Districts. Virginia Beach and volleyball seem like a perfect fit, but Great Bridge and Western Branch played for the Eastern Region girls title . . . Granby's Dan Butler, one of the area's most influential athletic directors, retired at the end of the year, ending a nearly 20-year run. Other familiar faces who won't be on the local scene next year include Nansemond-Suffolk Academy's Ron Killmon, who led the Saints to state titles in football and baseball during his 10-year reign; Maury's Harold Sigler, the architect of the Commodores' perennially strong soccer teams and Deep Creek's Crit Caudell, our all-time favorite interim basketball coach. by CNB