Weekend of March 21-22, 2020   A9
The Dalles Chronicle
TheDallesChronicle.com
SPORTS
TD swim program gives out year-end team awards
Lydia
DiGennaro
and Will Evans
were named
as Swimmers
of the Year
Rodriguez
■ Ray
The Dalles Chronicle
On Feb. 25 at The Dalles
Middle School, swim team
head coach Derek Shortt and
his assistants Nate Timmons
and Pat Shortt held the team’s
year-end banquet and award-
ed athletes with individual
and group honors.
The biggest moment of
the evening occurred when
seniors Will Evans, Jonathan
Snodgrass, Jose Reyes,
Bryce Harris, Bree Webber,
Hanna Rodriguez, Izabella
Montesanti, and Lydia Evans
were commended by the
coaching staff, and a few of
the veterans such as Harris,
Will Evans, Webber and Lydia
Evans took time to discuss
what positive effects the
program had on their lives
and what they foresee down
the road for the coaches and
the up-and-coming swim
standouts.
“The seniors were essential
in creating a positive and
resilient team,” coach Derek
Shortt said. “Their experience
was critical in getting our
swimmers to state this year.”
At the Intermountain
Conference District
Championships held in
Madras, Bree Webber joined
Kendall Webber, Kennedy
Abbas and DiGennaro in
the wild card state-qualify-
ing 200-yard freestyle relay
group, who scored runner-up
honors in 1:49.72, just behind
HRV (1:48.97).
The girls then proceeded to
drop one second from their
district performance with
a time of 1:49.16 to secure
eighth place in the field.
In the boys 200-yard free-
style relay race, Harris and
Will Evans teamed up with
Xander Kirby and Michael
Cole put up a 1:38.72, which
placed them third behind
HRV (1:31.11) and Pendleton
(1:36.54), but that final mark
was good enough to sneak
them into state.
The boys, however, had an
early start off the blocks for
a disqualification, although
they did finish with a time of
1:37.62, which would have
been another personal record.
Coach Shortt said he was
happy that both Evans and
Harris earned state bids in
their final varsity seasons.
The Dalles swim team had its year-end awards banquet on Feb. 25 at The Dalles Middle School and congratulated seniors, honored state qualifiers and gave out individual
recognition. Winning team awards for their positive attitudes were Lydia Evans and Jose Reyes, taking team recognition for effort were Kendall Webber and Bryce Harris, the
duo of Addison Little and Jonathan Snodgrass earned focus honors, and both Lydia DiGennaro and Will Evans were named as Swimmers of the Year. Ray Rodriguez photo
“Will and Bryce are going
to be missed by the men’s
team as well as the team as
a whole,” head coach Shortt
said. “Not only was their
performance in the water
critical, they were great
leaders. They helped to take
the younger swimmers under
their wing. We also had Jose
(Reyes) who joined us as
a senior and he improved
every meet and brought a
ton of energy to the team.
Jonathan also carried the
men’s team on the distance
end and worked hard at every
practice.”
Cole, a freshman, and
Kirby, a sophomore, are
expected to take on a bigger
leadership role as part of
the younger core along with
Skyler Coburn, William
Hoover, Jacob Comini, and a
few others.
“We have a lot of reasons to
be excited about what those
younger boys can accomplish
as individuals and relay per-
formers,” coach Shortt said.
Added to their relay efforts,
DiGennaro qualified for
state in the 50-and-100-yard
freestyle races, and Kendall
Webber made it to state in
the 500-yard freestyle, as
DiGennaro wrapped up her
50-yard freestyle in 26.04 sec-
onds, which placed her 10th
in the state preliminaries,
and she tacked on a time of
57.87 in the 100-yard freestyle
to lock down ninth place.
Kendall Webber had a
6:00.00 for her district cham-
pionship and went into the
state preliminary race with
a personal record of 5:55.77,
but blew those times out of
the water by nine seconds
with a new personal-record
time of 5:50.80 to tally eighth
place in state.
This is the first time TD has
had a state-qualifier since
Natalie Varland and the girls
200-yard freestyle relay team
earned their spots back in
2017, and the most athletes
to make a state trip since
2010 when there were eight
total swimmers because both
boys and girls relay groups
qualified.
Most of the girls team is
made up of underclassmen,
but Bree Webber, Hanna
Rodriguez, Montesanti, and
Lydia Evans were the senior
role models.
“We will miss our seniors.
The Dalles seniors were given awards and a few gave speeches at the team’s year-end swimming banquet
last month. In the photo are, from left to right, Jose Reyes, Jonathan Snodgrass, Bryce Harris, Will Evans,
Izabella Montesanti, Lydia Evans, Bree Webber and Hanna Rodriguez. Bree Webber, Harris, and Will Evans
capped their high school careers with 5A OSAA state qualifications.
Ray Rodriguez photo
They were a great group
of kids. Lydia Evans, Bree
Webber, and Hanna had a
great season and inspired
through their leadership and
helped a very strong girls
team accomplish a lot of their
goals,” coach Shortt said. “We
are excited about Kendall,
Lydia DiGennaro, Hannah
Haight who all went to state,
but we also have many strong
younger swimmers returning
next year like Paige Compton,
Addy Little, and Kennedy.”
Winning individual team
awards for their positive atti-
tudes were Lydia Evans and
Reyes, taking team recogni-
tion for effort were Kendall
Webber and Harris, the
duo of Little and Snodgrass
earned focus honors, and
both DiGennaro and Will
Evans were named as
Swimmers of the Year.
“We enjoyed the most suc-
cess in this program that we
have had in a very long time,”
coach Shortt said. “We are so
excited for the future. We are
also excited to watch Will and
Bree swim at the next level.”
Booster Club names The Dalles’ top February athletes
Baldy, Cardosi,
and Villa voted
on as cheer squad
recipients
Rodriguez
■ Ray
The Dalles Chronicle
the mat at state, and Arlet
was one of our backs who
was super-committed and
hard-working, and we wanted
her to be recognized for that,”
Sugg-Wallace said. “Ellie
broke her arm in November,
and being one of our main
tumblers, we weren’t sure she
would be cleared for state.
She worked super-hard to be
cleared, crying and pushing
As part of fulfilling the
through her tumbling passes
promotion of The Dalles
at practice, to be cleared and
Riverhawk Athletics, on
ready to tumble.”
March 6 at The Riv, winter
Joining veteran wrestling
sports athletes representing
head coach Paul Beasley
cheer, wrestling, skiing and
were senior state qualifiers,
boys and girls basketball
Steven Preston and Dusty
were nominated for Athlete
Dodge.
of the Month awards by
Ski coach Dane Klindt
coaches for being great ex-
amples to their programs, the selected his senior veteran
Austin Weir and up-and-
school and community.
coming freshman standout
On the cheer side, head
Lucy Booth.
coach Kelsey Sugg-Wallace
“I’m sorry to see Austin
gave her votes to senior Alexa
go. He was a hard-working
Baldy, junior Ellie Cardosi,
kid and showed a lot of
and sophomore Arlet Villa.
potential, but unfortunate-
“We chose Alexa for her
strong leadership skills on
ly, he’s a senior. I wish he
Dr. Cullen’s
Student of the week
The Dalles Booster Club hosted
an Athlete of the Month cere-
mony back on March 6 at The
Riv and named winter sports
athletes representing cheer,
wrestling, skiing and boys and
girls basketball as winners for
their citizenship, community
service and play. Not pictured
are December honorees Rainie
Codding and Lauryn Belanger
(TD girls basketball) and Jenna
Miller (January).
Contributed photo
Athlete of the Week
Lucy Booth
The Dalles ski team
Alma Garcia, Senior:
She is working very hard. She is sticking to
getting her goal of graduating. She sits down,
gets her work out and gets what she needs
done. She has had pretty good attendance
and will readily do make up work when she
misses school.
Congratulations
would’ve started three years
ago,” Klindt said. “Lucy is the
hardest working athlete in
the whole ski program, and
she did a great job this year.
I’m very proud of both her
and Austin.”
First-year head boys
basketball coach Greg
Cummings picked all-
league senior guard Jacob
Hernandez and junior post
Spencer Taylor.
The Dalles girls basketball
coach Brian Stevens picked
first-team, all-league senior
point guard Kylie Hoylman as
his top athlete to wrap up this
latest batch of selections for
February.
There was also all-league
winner and senior Rainie
Codding, and senior team-
mate Lauryn Belanger who
were named as top athletes
for the month of December,
and all-league senior Jenna
Miller was picked as the
January varsity basketball
Athlete of the Month.
The Dalles freshman Lucy Booth placed 37th and
was disqualified in her first two-career varsity ski
races, but then displayed her championship spirit
by posting four consecutive 11th place finishes and
had a 12th in the team’s final event of the season,
a giant slalom. Due to her placings and average
slalom times of 1:29.55, Booth had 72 individual
points, did not score in one event, and wound up
two places from earning a state slalom berth.
Alma Garcia, TDHS
The Athlete of the Week will receive a large 2 topping pizza from Papa Murphy’s. Congratulations to our winner 3-21-20
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