Recently in Prep sports Category

The PIAA's decision to shift girls' soccer to the fall in 2010 is still less than a week old, and as such it's too early to gauge the true effect the move will have on female athletics in the area.

Most of the coverage so far, including this story in Wednesday's Daily Record, has focused on the hardship the move will cause for female athletes who play soccer and another fall sport, such as field hockey or volleyball. But as you all know, there are two sides to every story.

Today, I got a phone call from Roger Miller, the softball coach at York Suburban. He understood the hesitation on the part of some athletes and administrators, but he wanted to add that for coaches of spring sports like softball or track, the PIAA's move could be a huge boon.

As I was glancing through the latest addition of Athletic Business, I found this story on a conference in New Jersey realigning one of their "super" conferences by the "athletic talent of teams in a given sport."

So a school that is a traditional powerhouse in football would play in the top division, but if its boys' volleyball team isn't so hot, it would be relegated to the bottom of the barrel.

Quite a difference from the traditional methods of geography or enrollment, which the YAIAA used in Jan. 2008 during its realignment.

Eastern York standout Andrew Nicholas is headed to Rutgers. In two years, of course.

The 6-foot-6 sharpshooting wing committed to Rutgers and head coach Fred Hill on Monday, media outlets in New Jersey reported. Nicholas becomes the first commitment for the Scarlet Knights 2011 recruiting class.

Nicholas averaged 21.2 points per game as a sophomore last season, making 63 3-pointers. He was named Class AAA third-team All-State by the Pennsylvania Associated Press.

Nicholas, nicknamed "Red" because of curly, red hair, has already scored 1,169 points in his two seasons at Eastern York.

Nicholas will have to wait 15 months until he can sign his letter of intent with Rutgers. The Scarlet Knights made a hard push for Nicholas last season.

In Thursday's paper, I wrote a story about a study by the National Athletic Trainers Association that recommends high schools coaches cut down on two-a-day practices, especially during the first week of organized workouts.

Obviously, the subject matter is a complicated one, and it's near impossible to explore every crevice of the story within the space newsprint affords. Luckily for us we have the wonderful, limitless blogosphere with which to do that.

So here are some of the impressions I got from reporting the story, along a few tidbits that didn't make the print product.

Riding on the heals of this story on the call to cut back on two-a-days, comes tips from the National Athletic Trainers' Assocation on ways to help student-athletes get used to the heat during late-summer practices.

Didn't school just let out? The fall sports season will be upon us before we know it - five more weeks and change. Now, when I was in high school, the fall season was my only one off. So I enjoyed my summer vacation right up until the first day of school.

But for so many others, it meant two weeks of two-a-days or getting to the practice fields by 8 a.m. and not leaving until 5 p.m.

So, what are your memories of fall sports preseason practices? Send your thoughts to ejones@ydr.com and we'll publish them in an upcoming edition of the York Sunday News.

We are in the middle of rolling out the all-stars and the answers to the first two blog teasers were revealed as Susquehannock's Dakota Heath and Kennard-Dale's Hana Krechel.

My last post was correctly answered, but I think I gave too much away. So let's see who can come up with this one:

Question: What is something you remember from first grade?
Answer: I remember winning my first spelling bee. I even remember the winning word, which was book.

Question: What are three items you would take with you to a deserted island?
Answer: A jersey, a football, and my track spikes.

Question: If you were in charge of picking a new mascot for your school, what would you pick?
Answer: Probably a tiger. Tigers are really fierce and they're the king of the jungle after lions, so I would go with the Tigers.

Even an hour after the West squad in which he was the offensive line coach for lost 37-22, West York coach Ron Miller couldn't say enough good things about his experience at the East-West All-Star Game.

"I made relationships that will stay with me forever," Miller said via telephone from Mansion Park in Altoona, site of the game. "I worked with some good football coaches."

Miller, shown below congratulating one of the state champion Thomas Jefferson players after the District 7 team knocked off his Bulldogs in the PIAA Class AAA semifinal.

He got to coach some of the TJ kids and was particularly impressed with Pat Hagen, the 6-6, 275-pound offensive lineman that will play at West Virginia.

"That kid we will watch on Sundays," he said. "They are great kids too."

It wasn't just the football people that impressed Miller either. He raved about Sheryl Ebersole, who works for the Blair County Visitors Bureau and runs the East-West game.

"I never met anyone like that," Miller said of Ebersole. "It was amazing. She deserves a shout-out."

Due to an unfair advantage (the ability to actually see her room), Noah has taken the high road and not outed the player in my previous post. And readers are inching closer to an answer on my first post.

I actually laughed out loud when I read this next one:

Question: If you were in charge of picking a new mascot for your school, what would you pick?

Answer:The Catfish, the (school name deleted to make it slightly harder) Catfish. The school is close to the river, so Catfish.

Question: Did you have a nickname growing up? If so, how'd you get it?

Answer: Slick. I got it when I younger and when I was playing baseball.

Question: Which would you compete on: American Idol or Dancing With the Stars?

Answer: Dancing With the Stars, because I can move it baby!

While you are trying to figure out who was quoted in my last post, here's some other gems I found from one of our upcoming Player of the Year Q&As.

Question: Are you a clean bedroom person or a messy bedroom person? What would be the first thing that someone would notice upon entering your bedroom?

Answer: Messy bedroom person, my bedroom is a wreck. My mom will hate that that's in the paper. The first thing someone would notice would be my posters of Orlando Bloom and the All-American Rejects.

Question: What sport are you the absolute worst at?

Answer: Softball. Whenever we play in gym, I just swing and miss.

Hint: This athlete and the athlete quoted before play the same sport.

The Daily Record/Sunday News will unveil the spring all-stars starting June 21. Here's a tiny morsel from one of our player of the year Q&A's to whet your appetite.

Think you can figure out who is quoted below? Take your best guess in the comment section . . . And be sure to check out GameTimePA.com starting June 21 to read the full Q&As, plus all the all-star capsules.

Question: If you were in charge of picking a new mascot for your school, what would you pick?

Answer: I'd pick a bear. There aren't very many schools with bear nicknames, and bears are pretty cool.

Question: What sport are you the absolute worst at?

Answer: Definitely soccer. I'd be awful at it. I just don't like playing it. I respect that it's a hard sport to play. And I know it takes a lot of skill, but it's just not for me.

Bob Rhein, the president of the York County Lacrosse Association, did some number-crunching on participation in the sport this spring. (see above chart)

Rhein wrote: "As you will see, our growth in participation for both the boys and the girls (1,959 total) continues to dramatically increase each year. When you take into account the total number of 12th graders who have graduated each year, the increase is even more significant. Please note that since West York and Kennard-Dale did not offer high school boys programs this spring, we lost a significant amount of players from these two programs. It is our hope that both school districts will vote to approve the addition of boy's lacrosse for 2010 to enable our numbers to exceed 2,000 participants."

The comeback kids did not have one last rally as Northeastern fell to Maplewood in the PIAA Class AA semifinals, three games to one.

The Bobcats trailed early in the final game before rallying to knot the score at 10.

However a six-point Tiger run gave Maplewood a 16-11 lead, making the mountain a little too hard to climb.

Maplewood will face District 7 champ and No. 1 ranked Ambridge in the state title game.

Still it was a great season for Northeastern. Finishing third in the state with a team that starts four sophomores is pretty good - and bodes well for the future.

The scores: 14-25, 25-22, 14-25, 19-25.

Northeastern, plagued by some uncharacteristic errors dropped Game 3, 25-14.

Maplewood now leads the match two games to one to determine who will play top-ranked Ambridge in the state championship game.

Ambridge eliminated Deer Lakes in straight games, 25-17, 25-16, ,25-21