Neuqua Valley's Yates has high hopes for track
Presenting a welcome case of reverse senioritis.
His first three years of high school Neuqua Valley's Dillon Yates spent the spring hanging out in the weight room, preparing for the next football season.
After making 7 tackles with an interception and 3 pass breakups in 5 games at cornerback last season for the Wildcats, then serving as a varsity basketball manager, this year Yates returned to his middle school background in track and field. He's Neuqua's No. 1 high jumper.
"Judged by this year alone I love track, and I'm kicking myself in the butt every single day I come out because I know if I did it all four years of high school I would have been a way better high jumper than I am now. But I'm still doing pretty good," he said last week at the DuPage Valley Conference boys outdoor championships, which Neuqua won.
"I have a bunch of friends on the track team, like Andreas Nelson, Kai Larson, Isaiah Robinson, and they've all seen how high I can jump," said Yates, who at 5-foot-9 can nearly dunk a basketball.
"I wasn't really going anywhere for football, so I was like, I might as well just try it."
His second meet was the DuPage Valley Conference indoor championship on March 17. He came into it with one junior varsity meet under his belt, clearing 5-7. Yates left with a fourth-place DVC finish at 6-1 with solid attempts at 6-3.
Outdoors, entering Thursday's Class 3A Naperville North sectional Yates has topped out at 5-9, but he keeps at it. He hopes to continue at the College of DuPage and see where that leads.
"I'm all about team sports, but I like how you have your own event and you're competing against different people, like one single person from each school, and just having fun," Yates said.
Solid track record
Former Waubonsie Valley track and cross country coach Craig Clendening, now living in downstate Lerna, checked in with this nugget: The 2017 girls track state finals marks the 35th anniversary of Waubonsie's longest-standing track and field record, boys or girls.
On May 22, 1982, at Eastern Illinois University, Warriors senior Cathy Brzeczek finished third in the Class A 1,600-meter run with a time of 5 minutes, 6 seconds.
Coached by Clendening in cross country and by Hugh Flanders in track, that performance was the last of four all-state runs for Brzeczek over 1,600 and 3,200 meters, plus one in cross country as a junior.
Brzeczek's 1981 second-place state finish of 11:19.7 in the 3,200 ranks second at Waubonsie behind the 11:12.1 run in 2001 by Joy Braun, daughter of former Waubonsie Valley coach and current Metea Valley girls track coach Jim Braun.
Brzeczek is now Cathy Sharpe, a mother of two in Riverview, Florida.
La La Land
On May 4 we wrote about Kate McNamara, the 2005 Glenbard South graduate who through a series of unfortunate events found herself using a wheelchair to get around most of the time - and with that, has entered the competitive world of adaptive sports.
Last weekend McNamara competed in javelin, discus and shot put at the Desert Challenge Games in Arizona. After ridding the jitters she finished in second place in discus and javelin within her classification and set personal records in shot put, at 5.88 meters, and in javelin at 12.33 meters.
"Just happy that I was able to bring my mom home some hardware for Mother's Day," McNamara wrote in an email.
Her discus mark was not on par with her 17.21-meter effort on May 7 at the Dairyland Games in Madison, Wisconsin. The good news was she discovered that the Dairyland Games mark qualified her for the U.S. Paralympics Track & Field National Championships June 2-4 in Los Angeles.
She's set up a GoFundMe account to aid with the considerable travel, lodging and meet entry costs.
"I am working on being able to go to the national meet," she wrote. "Of course it depends on finances, but I'm going to do everything I can to be able to get there."
AOA day
The Athletic Officials Association, the oldest referee training organization in Illinois thought to be the first local officials association in the United States, is celebrating 100 years. There's a May 20 invite-only banquet at the always popular Diplomat West in Elmhurst.
On May 9 the Cook County Board of Commissioners passed a resolution declaring Saturday as AOA Day in the county, which makes sense considering early AOA letterhead included Amos Alonzo Stagg on its advisory board.
"When we started doing the research it was absolutely incredible some of the things we found," said Laurie Jordan of Warrenville, president of the AOA's football division and vice chairman of its executive board. One of those things, she noted, was an obviously passe policy of "no women allowed."
Among banquet activities will be AOA Hall of Fame inductions. Inductees include the late Fenton (actually Bensenville High School) graduate Tommy Kouzmanoff, and current St. Francis softball coach Ralph Remus, who this season won the 400th game in his career.
Keynote speaker will be Jim Lapetina, a former DuPage Valley Conference football officials assigner who officiated Illinois High School Association state finals in baseball, football and basketball and now is a replay official with the National Football League.
He's a jolly good fellow
Chris Andriano, who retired as Montini football coach in November with six state championships and a record of 300-128 over 38 seasons, will be saluted at not one but two functions over the next month and a half.
As part of a ceremony recognizing retiring Montini faculty on the evening of May 25 in the school cafeteria, the 43-year physical education and health teacher is on a triple-bill with assistant principal Kathy Filipiak and retiring art department head Wanda Drabik.
That event will draw mainly teachers and families of the retirees. A celebration on the evening of June 30 also at Montini will salute Andriano the football coach. That promises to flow into the adjacent gym (and knowing these guys, onto the football field).
"We're going to try to get as many of the football parents and alums as possible, have a big blast," Andriano said. "Shoot, we hope to get a bunch of people back, that'd be great."
doberhelman@dailyherald.com
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