Cape girls' lacrosse to play Tower Hill at Wesley for state title
Super Tuesday - The Cape girls' lacrosse team will play Tower Hill for the DIAA State Championship Tuesday, May 31, at 7 p.m. at Wesley College. The Vikings are going after their eighth straight state title, while the Hillers are looking for state title No. 6 under head coach Wiz Applegate, the last coming in 2008, which was three in a row at that time. Sussex Tech softball will host Appoquinimink at home on Tuesday at 4 p.m in the quarterfinal round of the state tournament. The winner will play the winner of Lake Forest at Concord. The Ravens, 16-2 under coach John Marvel beat Hodgson 9-2 behind freshman pitcher Taylor Wroten and home runs by Jaykayla Sample and Rylee Shockley. Boys' lacrosse semifinals will be played at Caravel June 1 with Tower Hill playing Appoquinimink at 6 p.m and Salesianum facing Archmere at 8 p.m.
Scrap Iron - Some athletes have that "lying in a rusted pile of scrap metal with the junkyard dog" mentality. Hunter Schaeffer, a Salisbury sophomore “seventh” midfielder by way of Caesar Rodney, whose sister Chloe is a freshman at Cape, was on the field in the final minute with the Gulls leading Tufts 14-13 in the National Championship game. Schaeffer stripped the ball loose from behind an attacker racing in on goal, which will always be a highlight of the championship. Mostly you do know but sometimes you don’t, which is why the focused athlete always stays ready.
Free market - “How much do you make?” is considered a rude question especially when asked at the window seat at Nicola Pizza on a Thursday night in the dead of winter. Recently retired College of Marine Studies professor and sometimes dean Chuck Epifanio was asked that very question back in the '80s by a state cop and everyone just laughed. We all assumed Chuck was paid more than he was worth but we believed the same about ourselves and to quote lawyer Bill Schab when ordering a party pizza from Patty Price, “We’d like a lot of cheese but not extra cheese,” this was a crowd of cheap tricksters. Do athletes make too much money? No, they make what the market will bear, that is our system. My motto is "free and overpriced,” whether it’s photos or an emcee gig.
The University of Delaware hired Martin Ingelsby as the head coach of men’s basketball; he is the 24th guy to have that job, which would make me nervous. Ingelsby has been an assistant the last 13 years at Notre Dame and his father Tom was a guard on the 1971 Villanova team that lost to UCLA in the finals then had the trophy vacated and the 50 grand earned returned when it was discovered that premier player Howard Porter had signed with an agent. But the biggest question is “How much will he make?” Is it more than a professor of anthropology without a sneaker contract? Whatever the free market will bear Bernie Sanders, that’s what people make.
Gassed - Players no longer “run out of gas,” now the expression is “they are gassed.” Gassed is closely followed by "given up,” depends how much time is left on the clock. You can be in shape and get gassed; all athletes and sportswriters are weather sensitive. I went into the Cape softball dugout last Saturday during the fourth inning because I was “seeing spots hot.” And I stole an unopened water bottle, better than panting like a black lab puppy named Blue who sprawled into his water bowl following the Cape lacrosse game at Wesley last Thursday night.
Snippets - Dr. Lee Masser is a numbers guy who goes back to the spreadsheet days. Last Sunday he ran the 23rd Masser Five miler. Lee passed 80 years old but his smile and orange shorts are a constant on the running scene.
Alan Quillen ran the five-mile race in 42 minutes and dedicated his effort to his late friend Larry Windsor. The Phillies are 3-7 over the last 10 games, just two games over .500. Is this the second season Schuylkill swoon of slap hitters? Nationals are in town looking for a broom, a few hair brushes would be nice as well.
“The Future is Now” is a slogan of the 2016 Delaware football team. I would suggest “We play on game day” because that’s all that matters. Temple football is at Penn State Saturday, Sept. 17. “Yo Pal, we’ll hit you so hard, everyone screams Owl!” Go on now, git!
