SATURDAY
Swimming
SARASOTA — John Bruenning spent Saturday morning at Selby Aquatic Center performing a juggling act.
Shuffling through a loaded roster of boys and girls Riverview High swimmers is something that Bruenning, the coach of the Rams boys and girls teams, has become accustomed to doing.
The sixth-year coach has so much talent that at times it can be puzzling how to make the most of it.
“It’s like playing 3D Tetris,” Bruenning said of managing his roster. “It’s just trying to A, make everyone happy and B, make everyone realize you’re part of a team. I try to encourage the kids and the parents, like, ‘Listen, everyone will get a shot, but we’re trying to do what’s best for the team.’
“I just had a conversation with a couple of kids today, it’s like, you may not do your best event at the state series, but I’m going to give you a shot. You have to earn those spots. It’s challenging, and it requires a lot of planning and a lot of communication.”
Bruenning used the Tri-County meet between Manatee, Sarasota and Charlotte swim teams to experiment with his swimmers in events that are different than their strengths.
It didn’t matter.
The Rams boys and girls swim teams each finished in first place, with the girls’ team lapping the field with ease.
The Riverview boys finished with 500 points, with Sarasota (436) in second and Venice (242) in third in the 10-team field. The Riverview girls totaled 579 points, ahead of second-place Venice (238) and third-place Lakewood Ranch (214).
Winning is something that Bruenning and the Rams have become conditioned to doing, at least on the girls side, which has won the Class 4A state championship four years in a row.
This year is shaping up to be no different, although the makeup of this year’s team is a little unusual.
Riverview freshman girls swimmer Sydney Hardy has been a revelation for the Rams. Her arrival wasn’t a surprise due to her dominance with the Sarasota Sharks, but her quick adjustment to high school swimming has been a welcome addition to an already strong team.
Hardy finished as the high-point swimmer (40 points) in the Tri-County meet, beating out three of her teammates – senior Taylor Schwenk (37), junior Nella Duty (36) and sophomore Sophia Malkowicz (36) — who finished second through fourth overall.
“She’s humble. I think she has goals, but she doesn’t let her goals deter her from trying to constantly get better. Sometimes people have goals, and they set the goals, and when they reach them, they’re like, ‘OK, I’m good.’ She’s constantly resetting her goals and her standards. She’s extremely coachable and she works really hard.”
Bruenning said that not only is Hardy an exceptional talent, but she also is so versatile that he hasn’t yet decided what event he is going to have her swim in the postseason.
The Rams’ boys team hasn’t yet reached the level that the girls has achieved — which is an unfair standard to set — but they’ve made up some ground.
Sarasota boys swimmers Bogdan Zverev (40 points), a senior, and Andrew Malaj (37), a junior, were the top individuals at the Tri-County meet, but Rams freshman Fedor Igoshin (32) finished fourth and senior Henry Harlan (29) finished ninth.
As the boys’ team continues to improve, it could likely reach a point where it will have to sacrifice comfortability for the sake of the team the way the girls’ team has, but that’s the price to pay for chasing championships.
“It’s real easy when you say to them, ‘If you’re part of this, you can be a part of a state championship and you can be a part of a dynasty,’” Bruenning said on his pitch to get kids to buy in to a team-first approach to swimming. “A lot of these kids swim 12 months out of the year and they’ve been doing it for 6, 8, 10 years. So, the high school season, while it’s really fun and really important, it’s just a part of what they do.”
THURSDAY
Football
NORTH PORT – For all intents and purposes, the playoffs have already begun for the Golden Gate High football team.
If the Titans want any chance of advancing past the regular season, they will have to win most, if not all, of their remaining games.
Golden Gate can cross one of those wins off after it traveled up to North Port on Thursday and handed the Bobcats a 14-7 loss.
“I’m pumped about it,” Golden Gate coach Nick Bigica said. “We told our kids every week is a playoff week from here on out. You never know how things are going to shake out. If we want even a shot at the postseason later on, every week is a playoff game. We have to keep winning.”
A young Titans team that is still learning how to win needed a couple of breaks to go their way, and they had plenty of them against the Bobcats.
After opening with two punts and a turnover on downs, Golden Gate struck first as running back Mikenson Demezier put the Titans into scoring range, and junior quarterback Timothy Stauffer kept it for a 7-yard touchdown run.
North Port (1-6) was held off the scoreboard until the closing minutes of the game. Part of that was due to the pressure that the Titans generated at the line of scrimmage, but much of it was due to costly mistakes by the Bobcats.
Driving in Golden Gate territory in the closing minutes of the first half, North Port quarterback Jax Stoltzfus completed a touchdown pass to Ar’Marian Gilchrist, but it was called back for offensive pass interference. Moments later, Stoltzfus passed to Aydin Guerra for what would have been a walk-in touchdown, but Guerra outran the pass and dropped as he turned back too late.
An especially game-turning string of plays happened toward the end of the third quarter with Golden Gate leading 7-0.
An interception by North Port junior Katavion Comadore set up a Bobcats drive that went down inside the 20-yard-line. Stoltzfus ran in a 14-yard keeper, but it was called back for a hold.
One play later, Stoltzfus ran up the middle on a keeper and fumbled the ball at the Golden Gate 4-yard line.
The Titans handed the ball right back as a pitch from Stauffer was never secured.
North Port took over at the Titans’ 8-yard line, but Comadore fumbled on a modest pickup, and the ball bounced out of the back of the end zone.
“If we clean up one or two of those errors, we walk away with a victory tonight and it’s a totally different conversation,” North Port coach Devon Gales said.
Golden Gate full back Josiah Senecharles made it a two-score game on the ensuing drive when he bounced off a few Bobcats tacklers and ran down the right sideline for a 52-yard touchdown.
Though North Port finally put a drive together and scored on a 2-yard run by Comadore with 1:36 to play, Golden Gate recovered the onside kick to put the game away and keep their playoff hopes alive.
Demezier finished with 21 carries for 141 yards as he kept drives alive and gave Golden Gate good field position all night. Stoltzfus was North Port’s only offensive playmaker who moved the needle. He ended his night with 13 rushes for 90 yards and completed 4-of-20 passes for 72 yards.
“I think we’re learning how to win games and not lose games, and that’s huge for us,” Bigica said. “We don’t have a lot of experience on the varsity team, and we’re trying to learn on the fly and our guys are doing a heck of a job with it. It was about time we got into one of these dog fights and our kids did a great job with it.”
TUESDAY
Volleyball
VENICE — Jay Lanham may be a second-year head coach of the Venice High volleyball team, but that’s not telling the full story.
Lanham, who has coached the Indians for two decades – primarily in an assistant role – has learned that Indians volleyball teams typically don’t look the same by season’s end.
That experience, and a cool and collected demeanor, has helped Lanham guide a young Venice team to a second-half resurgence that it punctuated with a 3-0 sweep of Cardinal Mooney at the Teepee on Tuesday night.
“I think my team is believing in what they’re capable of doing, and now that they’re seeing a few more victories coming our way, they’re starting to buy in more and more and realize, yeah, they can do it,” Lanham said. “I think early on in the year, they weren’t sure. We graduated five seniors and four of them had won a state championship in 2022. So those kids have been doing it for three years, and the kids behind them that are stepping into some positions hadn’t really been tested.”
Lanham and the Indians don’t need to look too far back to draw on past experiences that can relate to what they’ve been through this season.
Last year, the Indians finished the regular season with a 10-10 record and went on to win a district championship and advanced to the regional championship match, where they were defeated by Plant.
Venice (11-12) opened this season with three straight wins, but went through some lulls, including losing four out of its next five matches, and has lost seven matches in tournament play.
However, there have been several wins lately that have signaled that the Indians have improved, and their match against Cardinal Mooney showcased that.
The Indians were swept by the Cougars on Sept. 4 but reversed their fortunes this time around with on-point serving, high-effort defense and 17 kills from senior outside hitter Melissa Apolonio.
Apolonio is one of several Indians player who have progressed as the season has worn on.
“I’ve had some ups and downs this season, so my mental strength has definitely gone up and I became a better player,” Apolonio said. “Coach Jay has always been on my side through everything, and all of the coaches have helped me. I think I’ve been putting in a lot of work in practice and it’s definitely showing now.”
Apolonio established her presence early against Cardinal Mooney with six kills in the opening set, but she was far from the only contributor.
Senior outside hitter Jacey McReynolds added eight kills, sophomore outside hitter Ana Julia Villamajor added five and senior middle hitter Tien Murray had four kills and two blocks.
Diving efforts for digs and well-placed defense was also key in thwarting high-velocity hits from Cougars front-line players Charlee Hermann (six kills), a junior outside hitter and Tensley Thrower (four kills), a sophomore middle hitter.
Senior libero Madi Robinson led Venice with 14 digs while McReynolds added 12 and Apolonio had eight.
Though it was a three-set match, the Cougars (12-10) were competitive in each set — scoring 21 points in two of three — and have been one of the best teams in the Sarasota and Manatee county region this year.
Though Cardinal Mooney lost coach Alan Knight, who stepped down from his position midway through the season, assistant coach and former head coach Leah Mihm has stepped in to lead the team.
“I committed to coaching, so I’m just fulfilling that obligation,” Mihm said. “We have senior night on Thursday and then we go into districts, and I’m fairly confident we’ll win our district. Then, we kind of restart the season because it’s single elimination from there. We have some work to do, but we also have some time to figure some different lineups out and get everyone healthy, and hopefully have a good postseason.”
Braden River 3, Lemon Bay 0: The Braden River volleyball team swept Lemon Bay 25-19, 25-22, 25-19 on Tuesday night at Braden River High School. The Pirates were led by senior middle hitter Molly Horalek (13 kills, two blocks, one ace, one dig), senior setter Mia McGuire (31 assists, seven digs), senior right side Chloe Pogoda (14 kills, seven digs, one block, one ace) and senior libero Rilyn Stiegler (22 digs, three assists, one ace). Braden River (15-9) will conclude its regular season at Bradenton Christian on Thursday, Oct. 9 at 7 p.m.
Sarasota Christian 3, Babcock 2: The Sarasota Christian volleyball team rallied to defeat Babcock in five sets, 16-25, 25-22, 22-25, 25-21, 15-11, at Babcock High School on Tuesday night. The Blazers won behind the performance of Finley Markely (nine kills), Ryan Donlin (nine kills) and Haley Bolton (six blocks). Sarasota Christian will wrap up its regular season at Bell Creek Academy at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 9.
Girls golf
Lakewood Ranch 154, Out-of-Door Academy 157: The Lakewood Ranch girls golf team bested Out-of-Door Academy by three strokes on Tuesday at Lakewood National Golf Club. The Mustangs won behind strong scores from Emily Storm (33), Wilda Kuang (36), Emma Albert (41) and Abby Ngo (44). The Thunder were led by co-medalist Brooklyn Cullen (33), Daisy Quintal (38), Keira McGory (41) and Julianna Whittemore (45).
MONDAY
Boys Golf
Donald Ross Tri-County Championship: Saint Stephen’s and Sarasota tied with matching 287s, but the Falcons won in a playoff to take the 32nd annual event at Sara Bay Country Club. Lakewood Ranch was third with a 293.
Individually, Saint Stephen’s Eddie Gau was medalist with a 4-under 68, followed by teammate Chase Nicks, Lakewood Ranch’s Donovan Plakyda, Parrish’s Owen Paoli and Sarasota’s Jake McDonald all with a 70. Tying for sixth place were Lakewood Ranch’s Alex Makarewicz, the Falcons’ Andy Dai, Parrish’s Tristan Pasch, and Sarasota’ Jacob Menard with 71s.
Girls Golf
Donald Ross Tri-County Championship: Parrish won the title by eight strokes with a 209 over second-place Lakewood Ranch with Out-of-Door Academy coming in third.
Lakewood Ranch’s Willda Kuang took the individual title with a 66, followed by Parrish’ Avery Banfill with a 67, and ODA’s Brooklyn Cullen third with a 70. Parrish’s Natalie Angelo and Cardinal Mooney’s Brooke Stevens tied for fourth with 71s, Parrish’s Olivia Agate was sixth with a 72 and teammate Phoenix Scanlan was seventh with a 73.
SATURDAY
Girls cross country
Lakewood Ranch places sixth: The Lakewood Ranch girls cross country team delivered four personal records on the way to a fourth-place finish in the Jason Byrne Division of the FLRunners.com XC Invitational on Saturday at Holloway Park in Lakeland. Junior Mackenzie Walker (22:55, 28th place), sophomore Caitlin Motherway (24:55, 59th place) and freshmen Brielle Clark (26:19, 85th place) and Kennedy Yang (26:39, 91st place) each ran their personal-best times for the Mustangs.
Volleyball
Braden River finishes in third place at Bishop Moore Tournament: The Braden River volleyball team traveled to Orlando this past weekend to compete in the Bishop Moore Tournament and went 4-1 on the weekend on the way to a third-place finish. The Pirates defeated Spanish River (25-22, 25-18), St. John’s Day School (25-8, 25-11), Martin County (25-22, 23-25, 16-14) and Winter Springs (25-22, 25-18) and lost to St. Lucie Legacy (18-25, 9-25). Pirates players Molly Horalek (33 kills, .458 kill percentage, 3 aces, 9 blocks, 8 digs), Mia McGuire (92 assists, 30 digs, 5 aces, 4 kills, 2 blocks), Molly Lynch (19 Kills, 27 Digs, 3 Blocks), Ashlyn Henry (36 digs, 16 kills, 10 aces, 4 blocks), Rilyn Stiegler (53 digs, 5 assists) and Taylor White (16 kills, 5 blocks, 7 digs) were the standout players of the tournament.
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Manatee and Sarasota high school sports roundup for Oct. 6-11
Reporting by Vinnie Portell, Sarasota Herald-Tribune / Sarasota Herald-Tribune
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
