The Official Newspaper of the Diocese of Little Rock
Every month, Arkansas Catholic brings you inspiring sports stories from around the diocese through our Good Sports feature.
For the majority of the Coca sisters’ athletics career — all of it actually — the roles of older sis Alexia and little sis Ava remained comfortably aligned.
Three years apart meant they never had to share a roster, let alone playing time, from the earliest days of soccer through various sports at Our Lady of the Holy Souls School in Little Rock and assorted non-school leagues. In fact, the only time the two athletes ever More... 
Annalise Stacey chuckles knowingly when asked about how far the Ozark Catholic Academy dance program has come in just three years, years coinciding with the junior’s time at the school. From pandemic restrictions in her freshman year to lack of experience in her sophomore and junior seasons, the team has seen its share of challenges.
“Last year, I was the only person who had ever danced competitively. That was definitely crazy. It was a test of More...
National Football League fandom is a many-splendored thing. Unlike college football, which tends to galvanize the majority of fans in a given geographic area, NFL teams tend to cultivate a more national following. Thus in Arkansas, while Dallas and New Orleans tend to attract the most followers, it’s not uncommon to find a sprinkling of fans for teams from coast to coast.
Even so, it’s safe to say the Cincinnati Bengals are a minority rooting interest More...
Exiting the Catholic High School locker room recently, Miles Marlow was flagged down by head football coach John Fogelman, asking him to step into his office. Like every teenage boy in the history of high school, Marlow immediately feared the worst.
“I’m like, ‘Oh gosh, am I in trouble? What did I do?’” Marlow said. “Because I definitely did something. I never get called into his office.”
Fogelman delivered the 17-year-old backup linebacker some news the young More...
There’s a lot to be said for healthy sibling rivalry, the kind of built-in competitive drive that comes with having an accomplished brother or sister. For evidence of that, one needs look no further than the Pohlmeier household in northwest Arkansas, which is shaping up to be a real hotbed of running talent.
Leading the pack is eldest sibling Isaac, a sophomore at Ozark Catholic Academy in Tontitown. Isaac landed his first individual state gold medal More...
Nick McDaniel may not be the longest-serving member of the Subiaco Academy faculty, but he’s already leaving his mark on the student body in positive ways.
In addition to his roles as science teacher, resident life coordinator and head residential life coordinator of Heard Hall, he’s also launched a new program to get the student body outdoors.
Two years ago, McDaniel founded the school’s Outdoor Adventure Program, which teaches participants the finer points of hiking, kayaking and More...
At age 6, when most little kids would rather be cooling off in a swimming pool or playing a video game, Reagan Zibilski wanted only one thing — to hang with her father Brad as he played a round at the local country club. And while the 18-year-old University of Arkansas freshman wouldn’t get serious about the sport until middle school, her early fascination with the game hinted at something special.
“I think it was the More...
One thing that sets parochial schools apart from every other educational institution is the sense of family felt by all. And when there’s siblings involved — and what Catholic school doesn’t have a few sets of those around – the bonds that form can never be broken.
That’s exactly what Fernando Alvarez set out to experience when he volunteered to coach middle school basketball at St. Theresa School in Little Rock this past season. Alvarez, a More...
Some years ago, Sgt. Maj. R.S. Jernigan inadvertently began what has become one of the most enduring traditions surrounding Catholic High’s Marine Corps Junior ROTC physical fitness team.
“Whenever I took a team out to the national championships, everybody’s got different tastes for what they want for dinner afterward,” said Jernigan, team coach. “They couldn’t make their mind up. I said, ‘We’re going to Denny’s because it has different selections for everybody.’
“After that, they would go, More...
According to prevailing schools of thought, athletic programs don’t achieve overnight success. After all, it takes time to build up a team, install a system and develop the winning tradition that allows a squad to compete at the highest level.
Somehow, Ozark Catholic Academy in Tontitown didn’t get that memo. In its first year competing as a member of the Arkansas Activities Association, the Griffins qualified for the 1A state basketball tournament, pulling off a major More...
This time of year you can find Trinity Catholic School chaplain Father Daniel Velasco on the court.
He helped coach Trinity’s tennis team to a first-place finish last spring. This year, working with sixth through eighth graders in the new middle school, he is coaching two coed teams of 15 players to have fun, achieve proficiency and, maybe, a winning season.
Father Velasco’s tennis skills brought him to the United States in 1993.
“I started playing tennis at age More...
One game into the three-game series of the Arkansas 6A state bowling tournament, Ian Draeger wasn’t totally feeling it. The junior Rocket and undisputed leader of the Catholic High bowling team wasn’t stinking up the joint, rolling a 214 in Game One, but he didn’t feel comfortable, either.
“At the end of that first game, I started feeling a little unsure,” he said. “My ball reaction wasn’t looking the way I wanted it to. My dad, More...
Father Bhaskar Malapolu stands in the middle of a stream of sixth graders pouring into the gym on both sides. It's the first period, and as the associate pastor of Christ the King Church in Little Rock greets them all, they reply in kind before quickly breaking off into their own little twos and threes. They’re used to the sight of him — it’s a Catholic school, after all — but to the bystander, this More...
Sibling sets are nothing new at Mount St. Mary Academy in Little Rock. When a school has been in continuous operation for more than 170 years, catering to Arkansas’ comparatively slight Catholic population, the same surnames appear here in bunches.
The same can be said for MSM’s athletes through the years. Culled from the ranks of those multi-generational families, sister has pitted against sister (and cousins, and second cousins, etc.) over roster spots and playing time More...
It’s something of a misnomer to say the Ozark Catholic Academy boys cross country team was a dark horse to be the first Griffin squad to bring home a state title. When you’re dealing with a school as new as the three-year-old OCA, every team in the athletic program is, to one degree or another, finding its footing.
That said, not even the cornerstone runners of this championship squad who showed up for summer workouts would’ve More...
When Andrew Cannon came to Arkansas five years ago, it was to wrestle for the squad at the University of the Ozarks. He landed at Subiaco Academy last August in part in the name of wrestling, specifically to teach others to do so.
“From the beginning, when I got offered the job, they said at some point they wanted to start a wrestling program,” he said. “Of course, that got delayed last year with everything going More...
To the naked eye, there’s not much that distinguishes Cole Carper from the rest of his freshman peers at Catholic High School in Little Rock. The well-spoken 15-year-old weathers the hectic pace and academic rigor of high school while looking for ways to assert his independence.
He’s worn Rocket purple and gold on the school swim team and looks forward to improving over the coming three years.
“I do sprints, freestyle and I’ve also done the 500 More...
Fort Smith Southside senior Avery Fitzgerald sets her feet and spins the ball easily in her hands. Staring down the opposition, her everyday vivacity melts into killer instinct as she takes a steadying breath and sends the ball lightly skyward.
In a perfect combination of timing and power, the 18-year-old whipsaws her arm into and through the ball with a gunshot thwack. The ball blurs like a laser, filleting the defense and catching the back corner More...
Catherine Covington Thorpe is so high-energy; you nearly break a sweat just talking to her. The sassy Monroe, La., native knows no other way but to get the most she can out of life and the people around her.
“I love launching things and starting things. I just love it,” said the entrepreneur and mother of three. “I’ve always had this major entrepreneurial fire in my belly.”
“Basically, what I do for a living is cheer people More...
Except for their grade and the common uniform in their team’s colors, there’s very little that Sene Harness and Elise Smith hold in common at first glance.
Harness, of Samoan descent on her mother’s side, runs with power even at half speed, changing direction on a dime. Smith, fair and blonde, is taller and runs with a long loping stride that appears as if she’s gliding.
Peel back a layer and you discover other differences: Growing up More...
STUTTGART -- The neon green tennis ball ricocheted off the racquet head with a soft pop, headed straight for Lisa Pierce’s forehand. As she watched the trajectory of the ball’s bounce, Pierce set her feet and drew back for a crusher to win the point. The opposing doubles team’s eyes widened as they awaited the blow.
Before Pierce could pull the trigger, a dark-haired young man flashed in front of the ball, snatching the shot out More...
CONWAY — The magic of small schools is the bonds they create between classmates. Peers literally get the opportunity to watch and share in one another’s growing up, facing and overcoming challenges and celebrating wins and mourning disappointments along the way.
Small-school athletics only magnify these relationships, creating bonds that last a lifetime. Take Savannah Mooney and Lilly Hill, for instance, who play basketball for the St. Joseph Lady Bulldogs in Conway. The two seniors enter More...
In the long line of successful tennis players to come through Mount St. Mary Academy’s program, the Libby Franks-Tasha Moreland partnership lasted a mere blink of the eye. But the doubles team will go down as one of the most resilient in recent memory.
Limited practice time. Late-season partner change. A bout with coronavirus. You name it, the duo faced it down -- along with the talented competition of a deep 6A class.
“Tennis is no joke More...
Like every educational institution in 2020, Subiaco Academy has had to make a lot of adjustments to the way it operates in the era of COVID-19, from social distancing protocols to distance learning.
So when Michael Berry, head football coach and athletic director, gathered the football team this spring for an announcement via Zoom, it should have come as no surprise that it would include a twist. The school would compete in eight-man football come fall.
"In More...
By day, Ryan Thursby is a mild-mannered math teacher at Our Lady of the Holy Souls School in Little Rock. But on the brightly polished hardwood of Catholic High School in Little Rock, he becomes the central character in the action swirling around him
“Everything is competition boys!” he shouts to the seventh- and eighth-grade basketball players racing back and forth. “Everything!”
Thursby and his coaching lieutenants, Nick Collier and Lane England, are leading a new team, More...
Asked what he’s proudest of from last season, Subiaco Academy senior Ethan Spillers offers a surprising answer about the Trojans swim team.
“We did very well,” he said. “We barely missed the state qualifying time for the relay by two seconds.”
That Spillers, a two-time state medalist and rising star in USA Swimming with an eye on the collegiate ranks, would speak so proudly of a group that didn’t make it out of district says a lot More...
On a spectacular weekday afternoon, a few longtimers gather at The Greens at North Hills in Sherwood for a socially-distanced happy hour as the occasional duffer hums through a leisurely nine before sundown. But for Noah Crisco and August Grunnels, both age 6, it’s serious business.
The boys are here for a golf lesson under the tutelage of Dawn Darter, head pro. Today, the lesson is chipping, for which Darter has rigged an inflatable target. One More...
Ask anyone who’s run a race — from 5K to marathon — and they’ll tell you the absolute spirit-breaker isn’t a hill, a headwind or a hammy but to be giving it your all and a sprightly woman pushing a stroller goes by like you’ve stopped to tie your shoes.
Julia Webb, parishioner of Christ the King Church in Little Rock, is one such runner. A former NCAA Division III track and cross-country standout, the 37-year-old More...
Alicia Straub didn’t set out for a career in athletics, a career that paid her way to college and nearly landed her on an Olympic team. Athletics, as the stately Jamaican will tell you, chose her.
“I wasn’t running (growing up), not really,” she said. “In fourth grade, I started running at Sport Day, which in Jamaica is like, extracurricular, but it’s not like competitive. I would always run and I would come first. The track More...
It’s a brisk January evening and a hot time in the Sacred Heart gym tonight. Tonight’s opponent, the West Side Eagles from Greers Ferry, can’t break the Lady Rebels’ press and steal after steal results in easy buckets.
With each shot that settles through the net and every foul the refs call, the scoreboard blinks. It’s a mammoth contraption for such a small gym; donated by local businesses, it’s something many schools would envy. And running the controls, More...
FAYETTEVILLE — It’s Tuesday afternoon at St. Joseph School in Fayetteville, and one of the most unique after-school activities throughout the Diocese of Little Rock is about to begin.
The door to the classroom cracks open and, one by one, toddlers in tights file through the door like little ducklings. Nine tiny girls in leotards the color of spring and one boy, a tornado in gym shorts, all get and give a hello hug with Rachel More...
As a star runner for Subiaco Academy’s cross country and track teams, Jacob Bristol has long accepted the solitary nature of his chosen sport. Long training runs and the structure of racing that places performance responsibility squarely on the individual have honed that understanding to a keen edge.
So it was to his great surprise that in this, his final season leading the Trojans, he would discover this singular focus on his own performance was blinding More...
Alan Webb has visualized many a finish line in his stellar running career. An Olympian and American-record holder in the mile and high school mile, he’s well-versed in the mechanics of setting a goal and then working to attain it.
This summer, Webb brought that experience to Little Rock, joining the staff of the UA Little Rock Trojans as distance coach. There, he guides young athletes to their own personal bests on the track and off.
“My More...
One stroll through the St. Joseph High School gymnasium in Conway is all it takes to understand this is a school that takes its athletics seriously. On every wall, the spoils of teams past set the mark for current and future Bulldogs and Lady Bulldogs in virtually every high school sport.
The school’s golf program holds more than its share of real estate among this accumulated excellence. Championship team photos peer down over multiple state titles, to More...
On a late Arkansas summer evening, a little buckaroo is getting ready for his eight-second ride. He’s decked out from head to heels in cowboy garb — even has the chaps — and he looks the part as his handlers hoist him astride his mount. It’s getting near the end of the draw for tonight’s competition and the little fella has a steep hill to climb, a mark of 88 out of 100, set by More...
It’s late summer or early fall, depending on your point of view, but either way it’s football season. All across Arkansas, young men gather to practice on fields just like the one a few steps from the front doors of Catholic High School in Little Rock. Here, hopefuls run through their paces in preparation for the season’s contests.
Tonight, line after line of middle schoolers run a conditioning drill that doubles as a whetstone for the More...
Pint-sized though she may be, Bobbi Barrett is every inch a runner. Striding purposefully through the halls of Mount St. Mary Academy in Little Rock, you notice a quick-twitch nature in her gait, like a rabbit that given a reason would be gone in a flash.
Even her manner of speech has a runner’s cadence, a rhythm of staccato words, laughter, a quick smile. In repose she sits easily, lightly; her mind at rest but on More...
Though smaller than you’d imagine on first sight, Brooke Green speaks with a confidence that commands attention. There’s something in that voice, a full-rounded alto that squeezes out any hint of self-consciousness.
Strolling out onto the field at Little Rock Christian Academy where she’s a rising senior, her voice is familiar. Here is where she commands the action as a defensive midfielder, a field captain role that demands knowledge enough to direct teammates and courage enough More...
Kellye Simmons remembers being more than a little skeptical the first time her son Parson showed an interest in diving.
“He was 8 or 9 when he started and he said, ‘Hey, Mom. Watch this. You’re going to want to record this,’” she recalls.
Kellye trained the camera on Parson striding onto the diving board of the family’s backyard pool, attempting a twist that landed him smack on his back. It was not the kind of debut More...
You’d think for a cheerleader as experienced as Abbey James, there wouldn’t be anything about the sport that fazes her anymore. A junior at Pocahontas High School, she’s been whipping up crowds on sidelines and wowing them at competitions since she was a fourth-grade tot.
But some things, she said, you just never get used to. Tryouts, for example, which are an annual fact of life even for a stalwart veteran such as herself.
“I swear it More...
Like all current senior Rebel athletes, Bailey Roscoe’s banner-sized portrait hangs in the Sacred Heart High School gym. Among basketball players a-plenty — baseballers and softballers, too — Roscoe’s portrait stands out as the only one up there for swimming.
She’s rather used to it by now.
“I’m the only one, I’ve always been the only one,” she said with a sly half-grin. “But I did start my own team.”
That’s right: Bailey Roscoe is not only the More...
If the inaugural season of Ozark Catholic Academy’s basketball program is any indication, God is a Griffins fan.
The little squad that didn’t even have a gym when practices started — heck, they didn’t even have numbers — finished the season with a 14-5 record and all the tools for the future firmly in place.
“It was just pray every day,” said Cody Vaught, head coach and athletic director for the independent Catholic high school in Tontitown More...
ROGERS — One could say Madeline Marks flipped from gymnastics to swimming in one day.
It happened when she was 8 years old and attending an end-of-year swim party with her gymnastics team. While the girls were racing one another in the pool, Marks was several strokes ahead of them. Even her gymnastics coach recommended she consider swimming.
Little did she know that the very next day, she was scheduled to try out for the Northwest Arkansas More...
Nearly four decades ago, Ronnie Williams walked into Immaculate Conception School in Fort Smith for the first time as teacher and coach. By his own admission, it didn’t take a genius to spot the Southern Baptist in the room.
“I can remember my first Mass. I’d never been to a Catholic Mass and the kids were singing,” he said. “They were the worst singers I’d ever heard in my life. I started laughing and I couldn’t More...
Nothing drives a competitor like a rival and when that rival is a member of your own family, the effect is multiplied. Andrew Boskus knows this all too well. The youngest among his siblings, and the only boy to boot, he’s had a lifetime of following in his sisters’ shadows both as a student and in the competitive arena.
Most biting of all was watching his older sisters compete and win in water-skiing, the family’s trademark More...
Through the double doors at the end of a brightly-lit hallway, Lucy Reyes and her eldest daughter Mihaela stride into the half-darkened North Little Rock Catholic Academy gym.
A loose gaggle of fifth-grade girls loll near the entrance not far from the grinning team portrait of last semester’s volleyball team. In the split second it takes for the coaches’ eyes to adjust to the change in light, their players swarm them in greeting
“Those girls are my More...
It’s game night in Little Rock. For a few bucks and a bag of popcorn, fans get a full evening’s entertainment watching Parochial League basketball teams square off. Classmates chatter and grandparents beam. It’s a tradition that goes back generations in the Diocese of Little Rock.
St. Theresa School’s girls are competing tonight against the host Our Lady of the Holy Souls. Two grades of Cougars are near-mirror images of one another in their style of More...
Kate Goldtrap shifts in her chair and doubtfully eyes the Arkansas Catholic reporter. The soft-spoken sophomore has been customarily polite throughout the interview but incredulity creeps into her face when she’s asked how one successfully twirls blazing batons.
Goldtrap, who did the stunt last year during a football halftime performance at Trinity Junior High in Fort Smith, doesn’t miss a beat.
“Don’t grab the end of the baton,” she said, a smile tugging at the corners of More...
Boyd Wright’s not the best duck hunter in the world and he’s the first one to admit it. But he gets as excited as anyone about the mallards making the annual return visit to their Arkansas wintering grounds.
Duck hunting, as most everybody knows, is a major draw to the Natural State, situated as it is under a major flyway and offering plenty of food and habitat in harvested rice fields and water along the route. More...
Catholic High Athletic Director Tim Ezzi has had better mornings. His quest to retrieve the school’s tennis state championship trophies out of their trophy case has run aground on a sticky lock. Try as he might, the sentinel clasp between he and his prizes stubbornly refused to yield.
After some exertion and a little torque, the latch finally gives and the window slides begrudgingly open. It’s as if the very fixtures here don’t want to yield More...
You’d be hard-pressed to find a more low-key elite athlete than Staley Tatum. Asked what she gets out of her chosen sport — running — the Mount St. Mary Academy sophomore offers a shrug and a shy smile.
“It’s just what I love to do,” she said. “It’s definitely an escape sometimes. If I’m having a really bad day I can go and run and I feel so much better.”
Tatum’s nonchalance is fed by the fact More...
CONWAY — St. Joseph High School’s Lady Bulldogs had a scrapbook season last year, winning the conference title and their first district crown in four years. The only mar on the Conway school’s otherwise perfect season was being denied a trip to the state finals by Hoxie High School.
This year’s seniors are looking to fill in that blank on their resume.
“We’ve been doing stations every practice and running and doing a lot of conditioning and More...
“Front!”
Catholic High wrestling coach Paul Mammarelli’s voice pops like a firecracker amid the dull thud-thud-thud of wrestlers’ feet running laps on the mat. On command, 20 bodies go prone, then pop back to their feet.
“Back!”
Wrestlers shoot their legs out in front of them, landing flat on their backs, then scramble to their feet. The more conditioned do the move smoothly; newcomers flail for air and footing. Then, thud-thud-thud, through the last quarter of the first practice of More...
There are few things that are as constant in Rodney Woods’ life than Immaculate Conception Church and School in Fort Smith.
But baseball comes pretty close.
“When my grandkids first got old enough to go to school, my kids chose for them to go to Immaculate Conception just like my older brother and my mom and dad, as the fourth generation now. I’m very sentimental on things like that,” he said.
“It really brings a smile to my More...
With broad shoulders, solid torso and powerful legs, Brandon Barnes looks every inch a football player and for much of his young athletic life, that’s what he’s been. In fact, the Catholic High senior’s hard work in the weight room and on the field of competition has earned him a spot on the Hendrix College team this fall.
But it won’t be in the sport he expected when he reported to Little Rock’s Catholic High School More...
The plastic jump ropes slap against the gym floor skimming under 40 pairs of airborne feet. Music blares from the stereo, adding further tempo to the bobbing, bouncing, bounding third- and fourth-graders of Little Rock’s Christ the King School. Practice for the school jump rope team, all 20 minutes of it over their midday recess, has begun.
Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!
The jump ropers hop, skip and jump over the brightly colored ropes until exertion flushes their cheeks. More...
The first season that the Trojan tennis team of Subiaco Academy was piloted by Brother Adrian Strobel, OSB, “All in the Family” was must-see TV, John Denver and Jim Croce ruled the radio and Richard Nixon took his famous final helicopter ride from the White House lawn.
But with the close of the current school year — and with it, Brother Adrian’s 40th season as lord of the court — the racquet has been passed.
“I’ve had More...
Julie Session stares out a sleek glass window wall at the matte morning sky. From the third floor of the hospital where she’s reported for her regular treatment, the view is an unbroken pewter slate stretching in all directions. It reminds her less of the enormity of her battle as the breadth of her resolve.
“The doctor, the first thing he told me was, ‘There’s no cure, but it’s treatable,’” she said. “There’s still that hope More...
Jeff Meares loves three things — his family, his athletes and hating Duke University.
Like a lot of people born in North Carolina, he found his way to the Tarheel side of the storied rivalry early in life and it’s only intensified with age. The only time Meares relents in his vitriol about the Blue Devils is when he gets around Father John Antony, administrator of Trinity Junior High School in Fort Smith.
“Father John, he’s a More...
Jenna Chadek knows only one way to play basketball and that’s flat-out, aggressive and hard. It’s an attribute that, along with ability, has kept her in the starting lineup at every level of her career at Sacred Heart School in Morrilton, which for basketball means since the age of 5 and in softball since the age of 6.
“I don’t want to give some little girl a vision of that ball rolling on the floor and More...
St. Francis of Assisi is credited with the familiar directive, “Preach the Gospel at all times. When necessary, use words.”
It’s unlikely that St. Francis meant to use hip checks and elbow pads, but then he didn’t say not to, either. And thus, these have become the tools of Catholic campus minister Kasey Miller’s trade as KC/DC, a member of the Rock Town Roller Derby club.
“A lot of things I’ve learned in derby have helped me More...
Four years ago, Payton Grice, Anne Moellers, Abby Bingenheimer and Sarah Sagar walked into the Mount St. Mary gym for their first basketball practice.
It was summer before freshman year and, with the exception of Bingenheimer and Sagar who grew up in Immaculate Heart of Mary Church in North Little Rock (Marche), none of them wanted anything to do with the other.
It’s amazing what off-season workouts can accomplish. Run enough lines, lift enough weights, withstand enough More...
The Catholic High wrestling team’s practice space is lined with thick mats and grappling athletes. Along one wall, backpacks lie slipshod on the floor under the portraits of past champions that peer down, gauging the new season’s crop. The air is heavy and rank compared to the late November breeze outside.
Along the back wall, assistant coach Matthew Crawford guides two wrestlers through their opening drills. This is Crawford’s third tour helping out hall of fame head coach Paul Mammarelli, but this year holds a certain More...
Stop me if you’ve heard this one: Catholic High is atop the high school tennis world.
The Rockets blazed their way to a third straight conference and state team titles this season, an accomplishment that saw one senior bow out in style and a doubles pair on the brink of perfection.
“This year, senior year, winning in the third set in the (state) finals, was just the best way to go out,” said Parker Stearns, who claimed his third consecutive singles title. “I had my friends storm the court, More...
In the sporting pantheon, there exist some rare examples of versatility. A prize baseballer is a “five-tool” player: hit for average, for power, can run, throw and catch. The winning decathlete shows excellence over 10 separate track and field events. The most well-equipped Swiss Army knife ever made, the Wenger Giant, featured 85 tools and 141 functions.
And then there’s Christian Briggler, 17-year-old senior at Sacred Heart High School in Morrilton.
Briggler doesn’t play every sport the More...
Four years ago, almost to the day, Mount St. Mary’s then-head golf coach Marilyn Lenggenhager sat in a small conference room talking up her sophomore star Taylor Loeb for the local press. After extolling the future state champion’s virtues at length, she paused and peered intently at the Arkansas Catholic reporter.
“And you know,” she said in a hushed, can-you-believe-it tone, “there’s another one.”
Fast forward to today, and that “other one,” 16-year-old Lauren Loeb, has ably More...
Just being around Mary Katherine Ashburn, you know she’s a terror on the volleyball court. Tall and lean, with good reach and the kind of angular body that can generate considerable torque through the ball, hers is a skillset that belies her tender age.
Talking to her, you know she’s the kind of player coaches love to have, smart enough to see the big picture and articulate enough to communicate strategy and positioning to teammates, with More...
Josh Chiles has a knack for making the record books. As a 182-pound senior at Little Rock’s Catholic High School, Chiles’ 2014 state title led the school to its first — and thus far only — team state wrestling championship. He’s also one of the select few Rockets to win back-to-back individual state titles, also taking the gold medal at 195 pounds as a junior.
This year, he again made history, in grand fashion. A junior More...
For Mary Treacy, it’s been the worst of times followed by the promise of the best of times.
The senior soccer captain and member of St. Vincent de Paul Church in Rogers suffered through a challenging season last year at Rogers High School, only to emerge this year with a new coach and new outlook on the sport.
“Last year wasn’t great; it was actually really rough,” she said. “We didn’t make it to state last year More...
Davis Bennett is a man of few words. Asked what piqued his interest in the Catholic High mountain bike club, the sophomore cuts right to the chase.
“They just mentioned it over the announcements at school,” he said. “I’ve always loved mountain biking, and I was like, ‘Sounds fun, I want to do it.’”
Bennett had ridden recreationally for a long time, but never raced. In fact, he admitted he wasn’t much of a joiner at all More...
Quentin Lunsford, athletic director at St. Vincent de Paul School in Rogers, apologized for being a few minutes late to an interview with Arkansas Catholic. St. Joseph School in Fayetteville had whipped a rival the previous night in basketball and Lunsford had taken the time to place a congratulatory call to the Panthers’ athletic director T.J. Barnes.
Lunsford and Barnes are kindred spirits. Barnes, a Kansas-born Catholic, and Lunsford, who grew up Methodist in northwest Arkansas, More...
Lauren Ramsey, 26, carries herself in practice with the cool confidence of a coach many years her senior. The first-year head coach of the Mount St. Mary Academy varsity basketball team shouts instructions to her players only sparingly and without the snarl that others do, but that comparatively soft voice still instantly nudges players into a higher gear as they sprint through their drills.
“It’s a process and it’s hard to teach somebody to go harder More...
In the 1981 biopic “Chariots of Fire,” Eric Liddell is a Scottish man of God who uses his dominance on the track to bring people the Good News. Qualifying for the 1924 Paris Olympics, he’s confronted by his sister who’s afraid his notoriety as an athlete is starting to cloud their goals of being missionaries.
“I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast,” Liddell explains to his sister. “And when More...
It is said that every great athlete or team is made even greater when pushed by a rival, those opponents who always bring out the best in one another. Muhammed Ali had Joe Frazier. Magic Johnson had Larry Bird. The New York Yankees have the Boston Red Sox.
And at Catholic High School in Little Rock, two young doubles teams treated tennis fans to a season full of excitement that culminated with the Rockets’ second straight More...
MORRILTON — Aaron Duvall, athletic director and head boys basketball coach at Sacred Heart High School in Morrilton, handles a lot of details in the final run-up to the season’s first game, not the least of which is issuing uniforms. This year, however, that task was simplified by one: No. 23 was a forgone conclusion.
“I put it aside the first day,” Duvall said. “The jersey was off limits. We knew that jersey was going to More...
John Vitale has always felt at ease on the sidelines, but it is only this season that he’s come home.
“I go to church at Immaculate Conception (in Fort Smith) so I know a lot of people around here,” he said. “I was really excited when the job came open. I thought, ‘Hey, what a great way to serve my last years as a football coach coming to a place that I’m familiar with and know More...
Angeles Gonzales may not sound that imposing at first meeting, but be advised: This 16-year-old, who has been practicing tae kwon do since the age of 3, speaks softly and carries a big kick.
“When I started I was too little to really understand what was going on,” she said. “When I got my black belt, I was around 8 or 9 years old. From that point on, I knew I really liked it.”
Now a third-degree More...
Alex McManus has a way with first impressions.
She played her first organized softball in grade school and after one year, high school coaches were telling her father to develop her pitching skills. As time wore on and the victories piled up, all-star coaches would take one look at the tall, powerful right-hander and pencil her into elite lineups all over the country.
She cast the same spell over college recruiters. Ranked 16th among recruits by online More...
SWISH!
There’s nothing quite like the sound of a basketball hitting dead center, the white knotted twine of the net snapping just so. It’s a sound Dr. John Wilson, better known to his friends as “Doc,” has been chasing for most of his 79 years.
“I never saw a football game when I was growing up. I grew up in western Kentucky. We didn’t have football there, we had basketball year-round,” he said, his voice as deep More...
The more things change for Fredi Knighten, who completed his last campaign at quarterback for the Arkansas State Red Wolves this season, the more they seem to stay the same.
“One thing you notice about Knighten … is how physically unimposing he is — at least when he’s standing still,” is how Arkansas Catholic described the then-Pulaski Academy junior in a 2010 profile. “When he’s on the fly, it’s a different matter.”
At 5’11” and a sleek More...
There was a time when Rick Duvall wasn’t coaching baseball at Sacred Heart High School in Morrilton, but there are few around the program today who remember it. Fewer still remember a time before he was coaching Little League baseball for the youth at Morrilton. And just a couple remember very clearly how it all got started, as only one who was there can.
“It’s kind of funny, this is the good part of the story,” said Aaron Duvall, More...
Even in our hyper-competitive, open-all-night world, it’s still not often that you can say a first-grader has achieved remarkable balance in life. But in summing up Peter Malakhov, that’s precisely the word that’s brought to mind.
Peter, who attends St. Joseph School in Fayetteville, is all about balance. It’s key to his figure skating, perched as he is over a blade less than a quarter of an inch wide. And, balance fuels his many other interests More...
Parker Stearns, as he delights in reminding people, saw it all along.
“Before the season even started I told coach we were winning state,” he said. “I even walked into my principal’s (Steve Straessle’s) office and told him we were winning state.”
Knowing what we know now, Stearns’ precociousness wasn’t too far out on a limb. In fact, given the dominance Catholic High and Mount St. Mary Academy tennis teams showed this season, predicting a 7A state title might actually qualify as modesty.
“It’s More...
North Little Rock Catholic Academy isn’t the largest school in the diocese, hardly so, but you can’t escape the degree of diversity that exists in the halls, classroom, even on the volleyball court. Here, a blue-eyed blonde bumps to an olive-skinned, raven-haired setter who positions the brown-eyed, mocha-complected spiker for the kill.
In the eye of this swirling hurricane of color and culture stands a lean, 30-something African demonstrating technique, barking orders and clapping his encouragement More...
ROGERS — Like many high school students, Brooke Matthews considers hanging out with her friends a top priority. But unlike most juniors in high school just beginning their college search, Matthews has made up her mind.
In early August, after a summer of tournaments, Matthews verbally committed to play golf at the University of Arkansas beginning the fall 2017. But for now, the more pressing matter, said Matthews, is to just keep playing solid golf.
Defending her More...
On the face of it, there’s not a lot of things upon which twin brothers James and Matthew Rose appear to disagree.
Both agree attending Catholic High School in Little Rock after attending public elementary and middle school was a great decision. Both seniors have their eye on attending the University of Arkansas and neither knows precisely what he will study once he gets there. They also concur that the lessons they have learned both in More...
Of all the sports Subiaco Academy sponsors, few look more at place than Trojan runners.
Fitting neatly as it does in the hilly countryside and miles upon miles of straight farm roads, the sport also embodies the ethos of the school’s Benedictine fathers: Get up, say a prayer, work hard and find joy in the effort before doing it all over again tomorrow.
“The community here is very supportive,” said third-year head track and cross country coach More...
The small gaggle of detainees reported to the gym promptly after final bell, the warmish spring afternoon already thickening the air. No one dares be late. They line up dutifully and follow every command — having nearly served their month here, they know the routine. And although most of them tower over the diminutive figure in charge, not a one of them steps out of line.
“All right, let’s go!” PE teacher Jan Pipkin’s voice ratchets More...
Hunter Keeling is a young man of few words, especially when he’s just been asked a question which strikes him as painfully obvious: Why fish?
Keeling catches fish for the same reason Catholic parishes fry them up on Fridays in springtime — it’s part of who he is. But it’s also a way for the Rocket freshman to connect with classmates and compare angling skills thanks to the Catholic High Bass Club, a competitive fishing group More...
To understand how poorly things started out this year for the Subiaco Academy basketball team — the same team that on March 13 became the first Trojan squad to play in a state championship game — Coach Tim Tencleve points to an early season tournament.
“We were playing so bad that sometime in the third quarter I just sat down and Coach (Randy) Terry, my assistant, said, ‘What are you going to do?’” he said. “I said, ‘I’m gonna More...
In keeping with its 2014 superhero theme, the Little Rock Marathon asked entrants to name their particular superpower on the sign-up form. One response stood out.
“I wrote ‘transubstantiation,’” said Father Jason Tyler through a hearty chuckle. “I wonder what the person processing the form thought.”
Even given the Little Rock Marathon’s fun-loving reputation, that had to be a first. But 2014 was a season of firsts for the 35-year-old runner starting with entering the hometown race More...
Everything you need to know about Sam Williamson and his love affair with the bicycle is found in a poster of a pre-teenage Williamson sticking the landing on a motocross-style bicycle after ramping off a picnic tabletop.
All of it — his shaggy, 1973 hair slightly aloft, the bike’s front fork and knobby tire jutting forward into thin air — is the literal picture of happiness and youthful abandon. And within the first minute of talking More...
Michael Drake, Catholic High School class of 2009, is Rocket basketball royalty. There’s no shortage of reminders of that at the Little Rock campus, from the team photo in the hallway to the banner on the gym wall to the current basketball team running through their afternoon paces.
“He’s fun to watch play. I’ve watched him since he was in high school,” said junior Chad Wharton, a two-year starter at point guard. “He’s a really chill More...
In just three years, a University of Arkansas squad has gone from nothing to gritty, undefeated conference champions; a team of runners, blockers and tacklers who this month took the field to play for a national championship.
It would be world news if it was Bret Bielema’s gang of blockers and runners, but it’s not. It’s women’s rugby, led by four Catholic pals bent on making you pay attention to the sport that’s become their passion.
“A More...
It’s said the people and things you love most are the hardest to capture in words. Maybe that explains why Grace Hambuchen, a senior at Little Rock’s Mount St. Mary Academy, has yet to name one of her favorite things.
“You know, I have named everything else of mine, but I just have not named my gun,” said the 17-year-old parishioner of Christ the King Church in Little Rock.
If you’re native to Arkansas, or a state More...
The last person who openly questioned Annette Dunham’s resolve, Subiaco Academy’s first-year head soccer coach recalled, was a fellow asking her future career plans while she was still in high school.
“I told him I wanted to be a coach and he laughed at me,” she said. “I told him what I really wanted to do was coach boys sports, and he laughed harder and walked away.”
That guy might not have stuck around long enough to More...
The idea of putting a bow and arrow into the hands of a bunch of middle schoolers — indoors, no less — might seem like questionable judgment at first.
But Elaine Miller, physical education instructor at Our Lady of the Holy Souls School in Little Rock, sees it differently.
“Some of our kids are really into archery, some of them go bow hunting with their parents, some of them have worked with the Game and Fish Commission, More...
SUBIACO — It’s a crisp, clear Tuesday night at Subiaco Academy and the crowd is in full roar.
Cheers and chants rain down from the student section and the jazz band cranks out guitar-heavy classic rock at full volume as the Trojans take the court for the last home basketball game of the season. Technically, tonight is Senior Night honoring five young men and their parents in pregame introductions.
But truth be told every night that Elizabeth Strobel — More...
HOT SPRINGS — “Gather ‘round and choose your thread color,” said Sister Carol Anne Corley, RSM, to a class of middle school students. It’s early dismissal today but nobody’s going home until they get their first fishing fly tied in Sister Carol Anne’s class, part of the art curriculum at St. John School in Hot Springs.
“Are any of you left-handed?” she asks, then seeing none adds, “Ah, what a blessing. Thank you, God.”
Sister Carol Anne More...
FAYETTEVILLE — Norm DeBriyn hasn’t coached in more than a decade, but you’d never know by looking.
His office at the University of Arkansas Foundation, clogged with photos, souvenir baseballs and other knickknacks isn’t altogether tidy, in fact, not even close. Several team photos on one wall yawn a couple degrees past level. He can navigate his iPhone, but anything more technical and he signals for his co-worker and fellow Catholic, the ebullient Elizabeth Sullivan, like More...
SUBIACO — Ask a cross-section of Brother Adrian Strobel’s tennis athletes what’s core to the old coach’s program and you’ll likely get a variety of answers. Ask the man himself and one thing immediately pops to the surface.
“They better be respectful,” he said. “I told them if they use foul language on the court or, you know, if you throw a racket or something that’s detrimental to the school, I will go out there and More...
For everything else that Alex Tully has conquered in his collegiate life, the cold still holds the upper hand.
Tully hates the cold, especially the particular brand of cold they serve up in places like Indiana, Wisconsin and right there on the campus of Villanova University in Pennsylvania. It is impossible to describe to his former Catholic High classmates, especially those whose collegiate lives played out in more reasonable southern climes. And, it is equally impossible More...
Asked her strategy for helping sophomore sensation Taylor Loeb improve upon a spectacular freshman campaign, Mount St. Mary Academy golf coach Marilyn Lenggenhager doesn’t hesitate.
“I bring her Gatorade and snacks,” she said, disintegrating into a laugh. “I mean, in 22 years, she’s the best I’ve ever had. I’m learning from her.”
Loeb, a member of Christ the King Church in Little Rock, is one of the biggest things to happen to girls golf in a long More...
With 36 years as the head coach of the Arkansas track and cross-country teams, a tenure that included 40 national championships, 83 conference championships and 23 Olympians, you’d think there’s some magic formula to be found in “John McDonnell,” the recently released biography of the legendary coach.
Amazingly, there is not.
Such is not to say the book, written with former competitive runner and coach Andrew Maloney, is lacking in details about the now-74-year-old retired Arkansas legend. More...
Hasten Freeman believes in keeping things simple. Ask him about developing his pitching and he breaks it down to its most basic elements.
“Once you learn one pitch, it gets a lot easier to develop others,” said the 19-year-old. “It’s all just a little tip of the hand to one side or the other or over the top.”
The rest, he said, is just hard work. Repetition and focus. Minimize mistakes. Work through jams. Simple.
Seeing things as he More...
“You want to know about faith?” said Joe Kleine, guffawing at the theological insight he’s about to deliver. “Faith is when you’re guarding the lane and you see Shaq coming right at you and you have to stand there and try to stop him. All you can think is, ‘Jesus, please help me! Send down some chariots!’”
When you’re a couple of insoles shorter than 7 feet tall, you can’t get through life without collecting some More...
PINE BLUFF — It’s the last practice of the season for the St. Joseph Huskies and no one’s running faster than coach Mathew Foss.
Before his players even break a sweat, he has a stray jersey to locate, he’ll discover one player inexplicably in the library instead of warming up, there are notes awaiting him in the school office and an Arkansas Catholic reporter just walked through the door.
Oh, and interim grades just posted with a More...
It’s a Wednesday afternoon and a group of high school athletes have gathered for practice in a nondescript gym tucked away in a Little Rock industrial park.
Exertion dampens the air of the bare-bones facility where coaches bark commands and instructions. Music pumps through speakers, but the athletes’ faces show this isn’t fun and games. The state championship is around the corner and things are not as they should be. One competitor crouches off to the More...
When Janaliss Torres-Lopez arrived in Fayetteville four years ago, she shared the same anticipation -- mingled with a little fear -- as any other college freshman. That is, with the notable exception of being nearly 2,100 miles from home and the only Puerto Rican player on the Razorback volleyball squad.
"I was pretty much alone here," she said. "I didn't speak a lot of English. Even the food was different."
Torres-Lopez soon discovered American cuisine wasn't the More...
If ever there was an unlikely success story, it is Aaron Duvall and the Sacred Heart High School boys' basketball team.
Duvall played for the Rebels in both baseball and basketball, posting a solid if undistinguished career there. During these years, he had an early influence in his father who was a volunteer coach with the Sacred Heart baseball program since Aaron was in middle school. This created a call to coach that was so strong, More...
Kayla Nehus doesn't know the meaning of the word "can't" except for the transformative power that word seems to have when applied to something she wants to do.
Early in her running career, doctors told her that someone with her flat feet can't possibly hope for a successful career as a competitive runner. All that did was drive her to land all-conference and all-state honors for three consecutive years at Mount St. Mary Academy in Little More...
FORT SMITH -- Trinity Junior High School ninth-grader Addison Mitchell took home two trophies at the U.S. Kids Golf Teen World Championship held in Pinehurst, N.C., July 26-28. Playing in the girls 13-16-year-old group, she helped her team defeat the international team. She also was the top-ranking American, winning second-place overall in individual play.
"In our foursome, my teammate, Megan Munroe of North Carolina, and I played two girls from Mexico and Venezuela. We were the More...
If Madeline Whitacre decided to just play soccer her last two years at Mount St. Mary Academy, it would be enough. If all she wanted to do was help the Belles' program continue to be a force on the girls high school soccer scene, perhaps culminating in a state championship, it would be just fine.
No one who has seen her play could accuse her of not leaving everything she had on the field. Certainly not More...
Lots of families decorate their game rooms with sports memorabilia. Few can say the photos, clippings, magazine covers, autographed national flags, competition posters and other trinkets from around the world hanging on the walls commemorate their own accomplishment in sport.
Not so with the Greenwood family of Little Rock. Covering the walls of their spacious home's game room are photos of Scott and Jane Greenwood and two of their three children, Brittany and Sam, doing what More...
By day, Reggie Rogers is every inch the mild-mannered Everyman. But on Friday nights and weekends throughout the school year, a startling metamorphosis occurs. Donned in his trademark purple and gold, no matter the season or the weather, his alter ego emerges.
Reggie Rogers is Catholic High's Superfan.
"It's exciting to watch the kids give everything they have," he said. "Lots of times, we are outmanned, outweighed, underdogs. But our boys always compete."
It needs to be underscored More...
Jake Bequette stood on the sidelines of War Memorial Stadium in the fall of 2008 and looked around.
It was the same field that barely a year earlier he had prowled during his senior season at Catholic High School, playing both ways for then-head coach Scooter Register. Dotting the crowd, faces of family and friends who had come to see him play bore wide, excited grins. The familiar white walls ringing the field and the bark More...
To watch Gary Taylor at work is to watch a man living his passion. In the hip yet accessible confines of his one-year-old Little Rock enterprise Go!Running or at one of the many events the store sponsors, Taylor moves through crowds as smooth and easily as he negotiated the field as a standout athlete at the University of Arkansas.
Hardcore runners share details of their last run with him or pick his brain over shaving seconds More...
Not long ago, the only version of wrestling happening in Arkansas was the body-slamming, made-for-TV stuff that showed up at local arenas from time to time.
But in just five years, the classic hand-to-hand grappling that started with the ancient Greeks has grown by leaps and bounds in the state. And as it has grown, so has the success of the Catholic High School wrestling program, led by head coach Paul Mammarelli.
"Our program was popular from More...
Sam Olson is one fast swimmer. Fast enough to win titles at the highest levels of his club and high school competitions. Fast enough to grab the attention of Division I and Division II college teams from Michigan to Missouri and fast enough, perhaps, to one day qualify for the Olympic trials, a lifetime athletic goal.
You’d think someone as fast as Sam Olson would have earned a suitably speedy nickname like Stingray or Swordfish or More...
Leslye Gibbens knew her son Benton had the basketball bug bad when on the morning of his first game, she found him up at 6:30 a.m., fully dressed out in his green and gold uniform -- for a 2 p.m. tip-off. The 13-year-old athlete, number 23, stands tall in those duds whether he's the wing for the Dragons of St. Edward School in Little Rock or horsing around with his younger sister Caroline in the More...
Those who follow Arkansas high school football know Fredi Knighten, 16, as the starting quarterback for Little Rock's Pulaski Academy, one of the most heralded programs in the state and a team many pick to return to the top of the heap in the 4A state championships.
It's not hard to understand why -- after losing a one-point heartbreaker to Cabot in the opening game of the year, the No. 2-ranked Bruins reeled off eight wins More...
By just about anyone's standards, 31 minutes and 41 seconds in a 5K for a varsity high school cross country meet stinks.
It's the kind of performance middle-aged weekend warriors turn in during runs that raise money for animal shelters and children's museums. It's not what upperclassmen with two years experience, miles of training and the elixir of youth propelling them forward clock.
It's certainly not the time junior Griffin Marczuk envisioned when he took the line More...
CONWAY -- With the 2010 volleyball season coming to a close, two seniors at St. Joseph High School in Conway are enjoying the fruits of their labors. Jordan and Jessica Justice, 17, identical twins, are making this their best year yet for the volleyball program at St. Joseph.
At just over 5 feet tall, the girls are not the typical volleyball player. Players tend to be tall in order to block balls at the net and More...
EL DORADO -- It's hard to know whether the move from London, England, to El Dorado, Ark., has had more of an impact on Michael McKinlay or whether he is the one exerting more influence on his newly adopted hometown.
McKinlay's winning streak has not slowed down since his family's move to Arkansas a couple of years ago with his parents, Marie and Thomas, and his older brother, Kevin. The 17-year-old is a member of Holy More...
CONWAY -- Behind the sweet smile and soft voice of Jessie Moix is a fierce competitor. Moix, 17, is a graduating senior at St. Joseph School in Conway.
"I like to win," she said.
Win she does. Moix was selected to the All-State Tournament Team in the 2A classification for the past three years in basketball. She was also named to the All-State Golf Team the past four years and All-State Soccer Team in 2009. Most recently, More...
"I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his pleasure."
--Eric Liddell, "Chariots of Fire"
You don't have to know much about running to appreciate Noah Findlay's gift, just watching him do track work is enough.
His long stride and smooth, easy gait glides over the track, accelerating as powerfully and decelerating as easily on the last interval as the first. Above the waist, no energy More...
Sister Lisa Griffith, RSM, and Sister Joan Pfauser, RSM, thought it was too good an opportunity to pass up when no one initially volunteered to coach a bowling team for Mount St. Mary Academy, so they stepped up to the lane.
The Arkansas Activities Association started bowling as a high school team sport six years ago.
"When AAA first asked, there were no coaches available to do it," said Sister Lisa, who is the school's dean of More...
The nine seniors on the wrestling team at Little Rock Catholic High School in Little Rock all started with the program when wrestling was added to sporting competitions at the high school level, first as a club sport four years ago, then more recently, as an Arkansas Activities Association high school sports competition.
The program continues to grow. Currently, there are 28 wrestlers on the high school team, and Coach Paul Mammarelli has initiated a wrestling More...
Bill Hogue started off as a volunteer and quickly fell in love with what he has been doing for more than four decades, most of that in the Catholic school system in Arkansas.
"Coach Hogue" has coached elementary and junior high school students for 38 years, primarily at Our Lady of Good Counsel School until it closed three years ago and now at Christ the King School, both in Little Rock.
Having been a coach in the More...
For students who might not be able to find their niche on the basketball or football team or on the cheerleading squad, cross country and track and field are good options, Clem Papineau said.
Papineau, Central Arkansas Parochial League track director, said he has seen over the past fours years that running and field events have strengthened students who are already athletes, but it has also brought in junior high students who aren't participating in any More...
Sister ministers on the Mexico border as Jesus would
Goal: CPR, first aid training for ushers across diocese
Catholic leaders concerned over new state child labor law
Catholic faith a front runner in Oaklawn Park backstretch
Your baby's name ‘almost like a prayer for their life’