Spring sports will end post-COVID school year

By Ron Brocato, Sports
Clarion Herald

The remaining weeks of the 2022-23 high school sports seasons are drawing to a close as the final five state championships are left to be determined by May 13 with the conclusion of the state baseball tournament.

By the end of this post-COVID year, team and individual champions will receive their final honors for the year in the spring sports of golf, tennis, softball, track and field and baseball, and our local Catholic schools will have the opportunity to add to the 11 state championship and nine runners-up trophies they have already earned.

Those honors look impressive in a trophy case, but many of them were earned by athletes who not only excelled on the fields and gymnasiums of Louisiana, but in the classroom as well. Eleven academic stars were among 30 local athletes who were recently recognized by the Allstate Sugar Bowl’s Chapter of the National Football Foundation/College Football Hall of Fame at its recent award luncheon in the Audubon Tea Room.

Among the scholar athletes chosen from a prestigious group of candidates for $10,000 scholarships presented by the Allstate Sugar Bowl were Garrett Cantrelle of Holy Cross and Roland Waguespack IV of Jesuit.

Cantrelle is the senior class president, a four-year football letterman and captain of the school’s basketball team. He also participated on the lacrosse squad. Waguespack, another four-year letterman, captained the Jesuit football team.

Also deserving of this elite recognition were Joshua Yancey and Dylan Burckel of St. Paul’s; Hayden Morel and Jason Brown Jr. of Archbishop Shaw; Josh Thornton of De La Salle; Casey Avrard of Archbishop Rummel; Nicholas Malek of Brother Martin; Pierce Williams of Pope John Paul II; and Cooper Couvillion of Holy Cross.

Long day into night

Anyone who thinks a baseball game takes too long to play, should have sat through the 22-inning, 6 1/2-hour marathon played between De La Salle and Willow School on April 13 at Avenger Park. By the time the game had ended at 10:30 p.m., only the owls in the Audubon Park zoo were still awake.

The game, believed to be the longest high school game in Louisiana history, was decided when Noah Arevalo doubled home Josh Scott to give the Cavaliers a 2-1 victory.

According to the National Federation of High School’s record book, the game is a state record for innings played, but it is unverifiable without microfilm research because the LHSAA does not maintain records and the local newspapers have not always reported results for documentation to the federation.

Jesuit defeated Rummel in a 2012 game that lasted 18 innings before Jesuit won, 2-1, and Jesuit athletic director David Moreau remembers a 19-inning game played in the Metro League when he was a student at De La Salle in the early 1970s.

Jesuit, MCA balance

Edna Karr, the District 9-5A’s newest member, is discovering that there is more to being successful than winning a football championship. Speed and power prevail when they are achieved together.

Jesuit and Mount Carmel used those attributes to great advantage to win the district’s track and field championship on April 20 and sent several qualifiers to the regional meet in which only the three top finishers will advance to the state outdoor meet on May 6.

Jesuit scored double points in three field events and ruled the distances from 800 to 3,200 meters to accrue 140 points in winning the boys’ team title, while Mount Carmel’s 138 points were 49 more than second-place Karr’s in the girls’ championship events.

While the Blue Jays were scoring double points in javelin, long jump and high jump competitions, Karr managed just eight points in field events, all coming in one event, the triple jump. Jesuit’s point total was a combination of 68 field points and 72 on the track, where the Jays finished 1-2 in the 1,600- and 3,200-meter runs.

Photo by RON BROCATO | CLARION HERALD

Mount Carmel’s Catalina Reichard  set records in the 1,600- and 3,000-meter runs in the District 9-5A championship meet on April 20.

Mount Carmel’s balance came from 91 points on the track and 66 in the field, where the Cubs posted double points in the javelin, triple jump and pole vault.

Jesuit’s 4x800-meter relay team of Michael Trepagnier, Tanner Salsman, Alex Siguenza and Jack DesRoches ran an 8:13.19, the fastest time posted in the three-parish area this year. Brother Martin’s 8:17.22 was the second-fastest. DesRoches’ winning time of 4:27.0 also marked the fastest 1,600-meter time run this season.

Karr (89 points) and John Curtis (120) had an abundance of speed but couldn’t produce enough field points to win. But, there were several outstanding performances.



 

Photo by Ron Brocato | CLARION HERALD

Krosse Johnson of Holy Cross passes the finish line in first place in winning  the 4x100-meter relay at the April 20 District 9-5A championship meet. Teamming with Ke’rynn Smith, Koby Young and Josh Brown, the Tigers  clocked a winning time of 41.39 seconds, a district record.

Mount Carmel’s Catalina Reichard established herself among the city’s finest distance runners with crowning performances in the 1,600- and 3,200-meter runs, where she rewrote the district record sheet. The 2021 and 2022 state cross country champion won the 1,600-meter run in a district record time of 5:09.32, just missing the tri-parish best mark of 5:04.06 set by Dominican’s Mia Meydrich at the 2014 state track and field meet.

Reichard also broke the district’s 3,200-meter mark by running the eight laps in 11:20.37 but ran a faster time earlier in the season when she recorded a 10:58.38. The official Class 5A state record is 10:59.46 by Laura Plummer of Barbe set in 2008.

For now, Reichard will settle for a school record after bettering the mark of 11:03.17, run by Kerianne Langley 20 years ago.

Three other local Catholic schools claimed district track titles.

Archbishop Shaw scored 185 points to win the District 10-4A title; Cabrini’s 169 points claimed the 11-4A girls’ meet; and St. Scholastica won District 7-4A by winning eight events in a 185-point effort. Their top athletes will move on to the regional meets.

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