Vikings videographers Maddie and Jocelyn capture live-action grappling

Vikings videographers - I obstructed the sightline of Cape sophomores Maddie Elphick and Jocelyn Fisher briefly before Saturday’s home wrestling match versus Salesianum, telling them “You guys are a photo I just have to get,” so they acquiesced and pushed closer together and flashed smiles of pleasantness. Maddie is the sister of former wrestler Mike Elphick, while Jocelyn is a running, tumbling, back-flipping Cape cheerleader. “They are great,” said coach Chris Mattioni. “Makes my job easier and it’s nice just to have them around.” 

Princess Anne - The last time I tried to find a Henlopen Conference track meet at University of Maryland Eastern Shore, my dashboard TomTom put me in the parking lot of a liquor store on main street Princess Anne, Md. An entire university had disappeared. I told the clerk: “Sherman Plunkett, who was on the Jets’ Super Bowl team, played at UMES.” I walked out just as the Cape bus was driving past. The athletes screamed something about a 12-pack and that I should follow them. Anyway, I should have attended the Henlopen Conference track championships held a week after the state championships ... at least both were held in the same state, which wasn’t Delaware. The Cape boys won the meet with 147 points. Caesar Rodney placed  second with 91, while Dover was third with 82. Smyrna won the girls’ side with 156 points, while Cape placed second with 103 and Polytech took third with 76. Complete results can be found at demilesplit.com, which at times inexplicably changes to md.milesplit and gives directions to the liquor store in Princess Anne.  

Rabbit chop - Tyrone Gibbs was a two-time state wrestling champ in 1975 and 1976 at 185 pounds. I recruited him to my track team as a discus thrower, but he became a 6-foot-2-inch high jumper and led off the sprint relays. In football, he was an unblockable nose guard and sometimes fullback. One Friday night, l switched him to defensive end without even coaching him at the position. A play went wide and Tyrone tried to pursue, but a pulling guard had hooked him and was crab blocking Tyrone like an actual crab. Tyrone responded with a rabbit chop to the back of the neck. He got tossed from the game by the official, who said, “You can't be rabbit-chopping people.” Tyrone was at Saturday’s wrestling match versus Sallies. Afterward, I introduced him to Cape captain Alex Taylor, who showed Tyrone the wrestling room. Tyrone is from the old school Savannah Road wrestling room, with practices in the sunken cafeteria. We are talking rag-barrel, old-school layered clothing to make you sweat. I once saw a wrestler with graying jockey shorts on his head. Say it didn’t happen, but you would be wrong.  

Quaker Oats - You can’t hype oatmeal, and it’s not William Penn on the box, but Everyman Quaker projecting the values of honesty, integrity, purity and strength. It’s a Philly thing, but I found the hype machine on spin cycle all weekend long annoying and obnoxious set against real-world catastrophes like an earthquake that killed 36,000 people in the middle of the night in Turkey and Syria.

Snippets - Corey Messick (Milford) of Roanoke College is the 133-pound Old Dominion Athletic Conference wrestling champion; he beat the tournament’s top two seeds. The meet was held at Shenandoah University Feb. 11. Corey's parents John and Jodi were there to enjoy the moment. Cape senior Alex Taylor will join Corey at Roanoke next season. Ella Rishko (Cape) had two goals and an assist as the Virginia Tech women’s lacrosse team won its season opener 14-8 over VCU. The Notre Dame women’s lacrosse team beat San Diego State 18-2. Jackie Wolak had two goals and two assists. Jackie is the older sister of Cape’s Andrew Wolak. Superia Clark (Dover) played defense and had a draw control for Syracuse, who beat Northwestern 16-15. The Oregon women's lacrosse team beat Xavier (Sawyer Walker, Cape) 17-6. Sawyer takes the draw and runs midfield for the Musketeers. Cape has won 68 state championships evenly divided at 34 for boys’ and girls’ sports. I was standing under the Seashore Striders canopy Sunday morning drenched and cold taking photos of Valentine's Day 5K finishers. Tim Bamforth laughed and asked, "Do you know your rain pants are around your knees?” So there I was rocking the crazy old guy image during a nor’east clipper. What’s next? A blue chair collapsing at a wrestling match? Go on now, git!