Girls’ volleyball reaching new heights by
yunqingCHEN
For the girls’ volleyball team, how you play is how you practice. And the more you practice, the better you play. On the court, it is the ability to stay focused and aware with consistency that makes or breaks a game. But working under pressure is not a problem for our girls’ volleyball team. In a matter of minutes, the girls are executing the new play and working on the fl ow as a group, helping each other out and changing positions to ensure that the overall result meshes with the dynamics of the team. It seems improbable that there might be more freshmen than seniors on Varsity this year. But that is not all. For the freshmen, a major factor in their ability to keep in shape by participating in club volleyball teams. “I think many of the players on the team were more accepting of the freshmen since they knew we had prior experience,” says freshman Stergiana Amberiadis. Being part of clubs like Stingray, City Beach and Vision provide experience with demanding practices, which help the perceived amateur and inexperienced develop their skills. In fact, participation in clubs is encouraged within the team, as it helps members bond outside of practice times. The hours spent with each other at clubs and other bonding activities brings the girls closer. The difference between previous seasons and this one is more than just age-deep. According to Assistant Coach Joe David, “There’s a lot more depth this year. They know a lot more than is expected. Last year, we played a lot of players who were good, and had potential, but were out of position. Hopefully, we can grow as a team and fi nd the rhythm that’ll get us to our goals.” With last year’s record of coming in second at leagues and making playoffs, the increasingly intense practices this year mixed with more extensive experience gained from clubs encourages the team to achieve equal, if not greater, results. “They’re young, energetic, and eager to learn,” says Head Coach Bill Fowler, “I intend to make the most out of that.”
You can run from P.E., but you can’t hide
DANIELLE LERNER—EPIC
Junior Gavriela Fine taps the ball over the net at the home game against Milpitas High School on Oct. 19.
Dual coaching benefits cross country team by
suchetaKORWAR
With nine races into the season, the cross country team is still doing strong despite being in one of the toughest leagues of CCS. Head coach Jake White says, “A lot of our runners run personal bests at each race, and we’re running really well as a team, so we’re doing pretty well.”At the Monterey Bay Invitational on Oct. 15, the boys varsity team placed eighth, and the girls’ varsity team placed fi fth. Senior Cindy Huang came in third, while sophomore Shaelyn Silverman came in fi fth. Both belong to the girls’ varsity division. However, one of the highlights of the meet were the large number of runners who had ran personal bests. Sophomores Silvia Signore and Jessica Fan ran their personal bests, beating their old times by roughly two minutes. Junior Andrew Kuo and sophomores So Masuoka, Anthony Hwang and Jeffrey Pea all ran personal bests in the boys’ varsity and junior varsity divisions respectively. All of the above runners had beaten old times by over thirty seconds. The team’s next goal are to have both girls and boys teams at CCS, and to have individual runners advance to the state meet on Nov. 26. White says, “The four other teams in our league all placed in the top 15 CCS, so we’re defi nitely in a competitive league. We’re just going to run our best and try to get to CCS.” The team has been greatly aided in its efforts to get to CCS this year by the addition of a new assistant coach, Richard Stiller, who is not new to the cross country scene. He’s been running long distance since 1968 and has logged over 100,000 miles over the years.
He also made several acquaintances with current cross country coaches in this area while running in long distance races against them over the last thirty years. These include Hank Lawson, Lynbrook’s previous cross country coach; Jake White, Lynbrook’s current head coach; Danny Moon, Saratoga High School’s cross country coach; and Walt Van Zant, Wilcox High School’s cross country coach. Stiller says, “I’ve been in these area for a long time, and I’ve known these guys and raced against them for about 30 years. These folks are all good friends.” From them he had learned a lot about how to coach teenagers. Stiller’s longstanding friendship with Lynbrook cross country’s head coach Jake White led to his current coaching job at Lynbrook. He and White ran together many times over the summer and it was White who fi rst brought up the idea of a job at Lynbrook. Stiller says, “[White] began a seductive process; he would bounce some of his ideas for the team off of me, and eventually asked if I would consider coming over to Lynbrook to coach cross country.” Now, he and White are working cohesively on coaching the cross country team. Combining both of their skills they have been able to foster the talent of the team. Stiller says, “My four goals for the cross country team are for the team to have fun; to help team members run the best they can, given their individual motivation and abilities; to support Jake’s, the head coach’s, vision; and to help runners learn something about themselves in the process of reaching these goals.” Stiller wholeheartedly supports White’s goal “to have every runner, regardless of their ability, reach the best performance they can. My job is to help get the varsity teams to the CCS fi nals.”
You know it’s a typical day in the locker rooms when you walk past rows upon rows of teenagers eagerly voicing out their pure hatred towards physical education, while deviously plotting a scheme on how to fake cramps or injuries in order to skip out of the day’s activities. I’ve heard excuses ranging from your standard, “I sprained my ankle,” to the more personal, “It’s that time of the month again.” But alas, being the intelligent Lynbrook students we are, I’m sure we’re all aware of the fact that most teachers do not fall for these pathetic so-called “excuses,” so it’s back to the drawing board for students to devise the ultimate fool-proof plan regarding their permanent removal from the P.E. attendance roster. Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and it seems to me that the ultimate solution students end up administering is a little something called “P.E. Athletics.” Instead of taking two full years of P.E., students have the option of playing a sport to satisfy their physical education credits. Students who take the high road and opt to suffi ce their physical education credits through sports receive a sense of satisfaction, thinking they’ve come up with an easy way out of P.E. There’s no doubt that P.E. Athletics is a popular choice among sophomores, juniors and seniors, as with seniority comes lack of motivation and a strong desire for the most minimal amount of classes possible. People, in general, are lazy. We’re always looking for shortcuts—in school, life, everything. The ultimate goal of a physical education class is to emphasize the importance of creating a healthy, active lifestyle in contrast to a hectic schedule of all work and no play. By allowing students the choice of opting out of P.E., we are fueling the train for America’s onset towards obesity. Sure, it’s understandable how people would moan and cry at the thought of running seemingly endless laps around the track, but in reality, these mere laps prove to be nothing in comparison to the intense conditioning and practices members of the sports teams go through. A large portion of the students who resort to P.E. Athletics end up joining sports like cross-country or track, and ironically end up running ten times the amount they originally would have if they had just taken a normal P.E. course. Many of us would much rather prefer to run four laps around the track every now and then, than to run the equivalent of twenty laps, or more, on a daily basis, which is precisely the reason why P.E. Athletics should be reserved for athletes who take up sports for the love of them and not just as a shortcut to laziness. There are numerous devoted athletes who play sports because they possess a strong sense of passion and respect towards the game, not because it provides them an easy ticket out of an extra and exhausting class. They put in tremendous amounts of effort during practices and constantly strive for perfection. Lynbrook sports teams, as a whole, are very competitive and selective when it comes to choosing its members. Lack of interest and effort inevitably show upon players who do not take the sport seriously, which makes attempting to play a sport for the sole reason of not having to take P.E. more diffi cult than it may seem. The truth is most teams already have enough experienced, truly committed players, and don’t need half-hearted students with questionable intentions to be a part of their team. In the long run, you end up back where you started if you don’t make any sports teams—having to take P.E. So why waste all that valuable time and effort when you could be playing Starcraft or catching up on the latest episode of Glee? Because the truth hurts, and the truth is that our sports teams would probably be better off without any extra noobs.