Athletes of the Week - Alexa and Alex

St Rose widget girls hung on to win a nail biter 10-9 over St Mary’s. The win evened our record on the season, at 3-3. We have good 4^th great leadership from Mia, Madi, and Brook, all of who have won athlete of the week already this year, but in this game, the star was Alexa. Alexa is a 3^rd grader, and she’s usually the smallest girl on the floor, but she has a huge heart, and huge determination, to go along with her quickness, and good athletic instincts. She scored the first two baskets in the game, and when you win 10-9, 4 points is obviously huge. She also played great defense, and was constantly encouraging all of her teammates, and being a positive force. Congratulations to the widget girls and to Alexa.

Our widget boys black team has played a tough schedule so far, and their record reflects that. Last week, however, they played St James, and we knew we had a good chance to get back in the win column. Black won 20-16, getting their second win of the season, and bringing their record to 2-4, with two games remaining in the regular season. Black is led by 4^th graders Stephan and Sergio, but they also get good contributions from third graders Jose and Alex. This week’s male athlete of the week is Alex. Alex is a three sport athlete, but basketball is probably only his third sport, after football and baseball. As the season goes on, he is learning that he can be quite a good basketball player. He is very good defensively, and this week, he finally broke out on the offensive end. Alex led the team with 13 points, probably surpassing his previous total for the whole season. Alex also has one of the best attitudes in the school, and along with Alexa, is a great example and model for St Rose.  

Athletes of the Week - Daizja and Aaron

Daizja has earned Athlete of the Week honors after leading her team to a solid win over a strong All Souls and a close overtime loss to St. Mary's. After a difficult December, the team came back from Christmas break ready to play and picked up a much needed home win against an All Souls team that had only lost one game. During this time, Daizja's leadership was very important for the success of the team. It has not just been from the amount of points she has scored, but in her ability to challenge her teammates to be the best. Mr. Moo is incredibly impressed with how Daizja has been helping him in talking to her teammates and pointing out areas to improve during the game. This has been a strong contributing factor in the team's success the past two games. Against a very strong St. Mary's team, Daizja led the charge making a great pass to Marla for the shot that sent the game into overtime. In overtime, with seven seconds left, Daizja shot a three that just barely missed. Even though she didn't make the shot, Daizja kept a positive attitude and demonstrated the leadership we have all come to expect from her.

St Rose varsity boys had a good team last year, but competing in the very tough (and tall) division 1, we only won 2 league games. We lost Emilio, our leading scorer, Ronnie and Evan, our posts, and Michael, the best pure athlete in the school last year. Going into this year, we returned 5 players but we don’t really have any posts, and the league is still very good (and tall). After a win over Notre Dame to open league this year, we had losses to St Mary’s and St John Baptist. We then beat SVDP and lost to Good Shepherd to put our record at 2-3 going into last week. On Thursday, we played probably our best game of the year in front of a packed home crowd, and beat All Souls 41-36. This brought our win total on the year to 3, which was already more than our total league win total from last year. Last Saturday, we played at St Anne’s, the defending champion from last year. People tend to exaggerate about things like height. No exaggeration however, St Anne’s had a 6’5 kid. They also had several kids around 5’11, and very talented guards and shooters. We were overmatched, and we dropped to 3-4 on the year, but during last week’s two games, our point guard really stood out. Aaron was our starting point last year, when we pulled him up from JV as a 6th grader. That experience, as well as the experience that he continues to gain playing on teams outside of school, has really paid off for Aaron. Aaron led us with 12 against All Souls, including 10 in the crucial second half, when we fought back from a 3 point halftime deficit. Aaron led us again in scoring against St Anne’s with 9 to run his season point total to 98 (he has since gone over the century mark for the season). Aaron is our primary ballhandler, best shooter, best passer, and a good intuitive defender. Aaron also has stepped into a leadership role, which isn’t easy as a 7th grader. He is well liked and respected by all his teammates, opponents, and certainly by his coaches. I am very lucky to be able to coach him.

Athletes of the Week - Julian And Brooklin

The widget girls played St Pius 3rd grade the last game before Christmas, and rolled to their second win of the season, evening their record, and matching their win total from all of last year. Previously this year, 4th graders Madi and Mia have won Athlete of the Week, and now another 4th grade girl wins the honor. Brooklin is an excellent all-around athlete. She can throw the football almost as well as any of the boys in the class, is consistently the best or one of the best at any sport we play in P.E., is an excellent volleyball player, and more to the point in the winter, she’s a rapidly improving basketball player. She is fast, gets lots of steals and loose balls, blocks shots, and against St Pius, she scored a career high 12 points. With Brook, Madi, and Mia playing both basketball and volleyball, the future looks bright for the St Rose girls’ programs going forward.

Our varsity boys division 1 team got off to a great start to the year, winning the Blessed Sacrament pre-season tournament. We then played Notre Dame, and sailed to a victory, continuing our momentum. Then, reality set in. We had back to back games against St Mary’s and Nativity, and although we were in both games, we ended up losing both by about 10 points. Therefore, we headed into the last week before Christmas with a 1-2 league record. On Tuesday, we played St Vincent de Paul on the road. We had previously beaten SVDP in the championship game of the Blessed Sacrament tournament by 22, but it was a 6 point game mid 4th quarter before we finally ran away. We were confident going into this game, but SVDP has 2 6 footers, one of who is a very capable left-handed scorer. Tall teams have given us lots of problems in the past, but we were able to play at our pace (fast) and stretched out to a double digit lead by halftime. Aaron played a great all-around game, and Mario came off the bench to tie his career high with 8 points, but the player who drew the most attention from the defense again was Julian. Julian is a tremendous all-around athlete, and although soccer is his main sport, he has tons of talent in basketball, and his skills are improving all the time. Julian really shined in our next game against Good Shepherd. We got off to a 10-0 start, and although I still thought they looked dangerous, I think everyone relaxed and assumed we were fine. We weren’t. By half, we were down 20-16. Then disaster struck. Every shot we took rimmed out, and every shot they took found the bottom. More importantly though, we gave up. We were shell-shocked, we were bickering, we were unaware, and we had the worst quarter of basketball I’ve been associated with in my life. At the end of 3, we found ourselves in a 43-18 hole. With 6 minutes left, there was no chance we were going to come back and win, but I challenged the team to show some fight, show some pride, and come back out and compete as hard as possible for 6 minutes. During the 4th quarter, Julian’s leadership came through more than I’ve ever seen it before. He scored 13 points in the game to bring his season total to 71, but way more importantly, he didn’t give up. He was vocal, he dived all over the floor, he fought for rebounds, he took the ball to the basket with abandon, and with his team falling apart around him, he showed leadership qualities to match his athletic qualities, and this will serve him and us very well going forward in the new year.