THE GAZETTE
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JERSEY
Continued from Page B-1 one would expect. If it did, even Postolache admitted that she was not the favorite to win last year’s region title. Ranked No. 70 of 1,521 in the USTA Girls 14s, Wootton freshman Miranda Deng certainly appears poised for a successful high school campaign, but questions stillremainonhowshewillhandle
the pressure of team expectations. “Playing for a team is very different,” Postolache said. “You’re playing for yourself, but you also know that your score counts for the school’s score and that is added pressure.” While that weight and expectations can be paralyzing for some, the load doesn’t have to be a bad thing, Postolache said. In fact, she used it as motivation in last year’s first run to the state tournament by a Richard Mont-
gomery singles player in recent history. Knowing every point a match win earns can be the difference between a team win or loss, and being surrounded by supportive teammates pushes her more, Postolache said. There is also generally a wider range of talent level that athletes must adjust to on a daily basis, which can be tricky. It is a scenario not limited to tennis players, but athletes in individual and team sports across
Wednesday, September 11, 2013 r
the board. “Maybe for their club [soccer] team they’re playing a certain position, but for me they’re playing a different position or formation and now they have to switch their brain,” longtime Our Lady of Good Counsel girls’ soccer coach Jim Bruno said. “Or you might be a big fish on your club team, but not be a big fish on your high school team. There are some other mental things going on.”
Levels also vary within the average high school athletic teams, higher level athletes might have to adjust their games accordingly in order to play more efficiently with their team, Bruno added. Performing for classmates and friends is not an opportunity elite-level athletes are faced with very often outside of high school athletics, Bruno said. The pressure to live up to expectations can put extra weight on
these athletes’ shoulders and everyone handles the load differently. But no one can deny the honor of representing a home school and community in athletic competition, Bruno said. “Yes, you get more nervous,it is more nerve-wracking because you know what you do also affects your team,” Postolache said. “But for me, that added pressure is helpful.” jbeekman@gazette.net
DEFENSE
Continued from Page B-1 “They had thrown it twice before, so when I dropped back I was like, ‘I’m going to get it this time,’” Powell said. “I got it and started running, and I just barely made it, I was just thinking, ‘Thank God I didn’t cramp up.’” The B-CC defensive unit shut out the Churchill offense over the final three quarters of the contest. A nineplay, 62-yard scoring drive in the first quarter was the only real blemish for the group, which forced the Bulldogs into four turnovers and seven punts. “We went to the locker room [at halftime] and we had that mindset that we were going to come out and get this win,” safety Keenan McUmber said. “We were tired and they were tired, but we have been working hard all summer running hills and all this stuff for conditioning, so we were ready for it.” Barons’ defensive coordinator Chad Mack also provided his insight on the Churchill offense after moving over from the Bulldogs’ staff this year. “We had a whole film study thing yesterday, with the day off for the Jewish holiday, a lot of us just watched film all day,” Powell said. “We’ve been going over their plays, I made flashcards of their different formations, so it was great to have Coach Mack’s help on that.” Mack’s defense will certainly be tested on Thursday (6:30 p.m.) when B-CC hosts a Thomas S. Wootton team that scored 41 points against Walter Johnson on Saturday.
HOME
Continued from Page B-1 blanket the school’s campus. Every day after school, the team travels to Morris Park to train. The Trojans don’t have a home game until they’re scheduled to play Thomas S. Wootton on Oct. 18 when the school’s field is expected to be accessible. “We’re making do with what we have and we’re having a positive attitude while we’re doing it,” Bowling said. “This is 11 people coming together to operate as one unit. If we can come together and adapt this philosophy of 11 playing as one, we can do great things at Gaithersburg.” Bowling would appear the perfect man for the job. After serving as Calvin Coolidge High’s boys’ soccer coach in
OPPONENT
Continued from Page B-1 Now a senior, Herbert has emerged as one of Montgomery County’s top linebackers and someone Kim calls “definitely one of the best kids I’ve ever coached.” Herbert’s biggest strength on the field is his intelligence, and even on that awkward touchdown return, he showed it. All week leading up to the
Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School safety Keenan McUmber blocks Winston Churchill’s extra point attempt on Friday. “It is great for this program to come back and beat the returning division champs the first week of the season,”
B-CC coach Josh Singer said. “We knew they would be a tough match up. They are a great team, a well-coached team,
PHOTOS BY BILL RYAN/THE GAZETTE
Winston Churchill High School quarterback Sean Strittmatter gets tackled by Bethesda-Chevy Chase’s Kevin Washington on Friday.
and Joe Allen has them up at the top every year. For the coaching staff it was a nice win, with Coach Mack getting a
win as a defensive coordinator against his old team. We are just confident, but now getting ready for Wootton.”
Washington, D.C. for two years, he moved to Gaithersburg and started working for the city as a city planner in 2011. With a demanding work schedule, Bowling often arrives at the office early in the morning to ensure he’s able to start training on time. He walks from his office to the school and said he’s received a tremendous outpouring of support from his coworkers and supervisors at City Hall. “I’m very blessed to be in this situation and there’s nowhere else I’d want to be coaching,” Bowling said. “I love coaching at this school because it’s the city I live in and work in. This is a school of 2,000 students and a city of 60,000 residents and I believe we can do great things with the group that we have.” The Trojans are a young and diverse team, sprinkled with a mix of veterans who will lead
a club that Bowling hopes will play a possession-based style similar to his favorite Spanish sides. Gaithersburg finished 5-8-0 last season under Steve Schwarten and lost in the first round of the Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association’s playoffs in penalty kicks. In the previous four years since the club’s last winning season in 2008, Gaithersburg has gone a combined 15-30-4. “He’s definitely putting in time even though he works a lot and he really believes we can do special things,” junior striker Gustavo Garcia said of Bowling. “I think we all want to surprise people and I feel like some people have no clue that there’s talent in Gaithersburg. The first thing he noticed is we have talent.” Whether or not the Trojans will be able to utilize that tal-
ent and translate it into results remains to be seen, but junior left back Parker Rist also is optimistic about the transformation of the attitude of his teammates since Bowling’s taken over. “We have lots of talent and lots of potential and having him in here to be very positive and motivational can bring out our full potential,” Rist said. While potential is one thing, the reality of having to play 10 consecutive road matches — and then play host to the defending state champions for the only home game — is daunting. “It’s going to be tough not being at home, not having that home feeling,” said junior goalkeeper Cristian Reyes. “We’ve talked through it a lot as a group and we pretty much said that if we have a field and we have a ball, we’re ready to
play. It doesn’t matter where we’re at.” Added Rist: “It’s not what we would prefer, but it’s also not going to be too different. We’re constantly somewhere else, moving and changing. We’re going to keep fighting through no matter what.” It’s that sort of positive mentality that Bowling’s infectious personality has seemingly imparted on all his players as the 2013 campaign gets underway. And it’s one he hopes will, along with hard work on the field, contribute to a successful tenure at his neighborhood high school. “I don’t want people to take us lightly,” Bowling said. “They’ll see that we’re a sleeping giant waiting to wake up from this nap. Once we get rolling, I think it’s going to be something else.”
game, Herbert practiced defending a play Damascus tended to run from a Bulldog formation, two receivers to the strong side and one on the weak side with a tight end on the field. The slot receiver would run a curl route into Herbert’s zone, and Herbert could jump the route. The first day of practice, Herbert got in proper position but kept dropping the interception. By the end of the week, he intercepted it every time — even
when he didn’t know in advance the play was coming. Damascus lined up in Bulldog for the first time late in the game, and Herbert recognized it immediately, jumped the curl route, scored his first varsity touchdown and showed how far he had come in a short period of time. Herbert said he was “a small presence on the field” during his freshman year on junior varsity. As program policy, Kim puts anyone he believes will be a key
varsity contributor as a junior on varsity as a sophomore. Really, that’s the only reason Herbert made varsity so soon. Herbert figured, if he played as hard as he could, he could at least ensure he wouldn’t be buried on the bench. But during preseason practice, he earned a starting job at outside linebacker. Kim even had Herbert set the defense, a responsibility typically assigned to a middle linebacker. Herbert did it
so well, his position didn’t matter. “I could tell him what the gameplan was on Monday after working on it for nine hours on Sunday, and he would learn it snap of the finger, and he would know it,” Kim said. As a junior Herbert became a captain, an honor Kim said goes to seniors “99.9 percent” of the time in his program. Now, Herbert is still setting the defense, and he’s fielding interest from Cornell, Towson, Le-
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Gaithersburg High School first-year coach Matt Bowling instructs his team during practice on Friday at Morris Park.
high, Monmouth and University of Maryland, College Park. Kim wants Herbert to pick Cornell, just so the coach can say he sent the first Seneca Valley football player onto an Ivy League team. “He talks to me about that all the time,” Herbert said. If history is any indication, Herbert will swiftly process Kim’s words, analyze them and then make the best decision possible. dfeldman@gazette.net