Varsity Kansas - The Blog

by joanna

Heights coach Rick Wheeler and I talked a little bit today about a future story, his upcoming trip to Canton and Ian Knight.

I then gave Knight, a defensive end, a call to talk about how the recruiting is going.

Here’s what he had to say:

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by joanna

Dan Adelhardt says he hasn’t been ducking me. You make the call — I phoned him about a month ago when I started my football posts on the blog. I left him a message on his cell phone, he never called back. I called him at home today and he took the call, said he’d saved my message, just never called me. Then he laughed and all was forgiven. Seriously, how can you possibly be mad at Adelhardt? He’s so dang genuine and he’s funny and you can’t help but like the guy.

All right, onto the Kapaun update:

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by joanna

Well, I posted this not too long ago, but it seems to have disappeared, so here we go again.

South has hired Ty White, 45, as its boys basketball coach. White spent the past two seasons as a South assistant and was a volunteer assistant for one year at Southeast.

He’s one of three new coaches for next season — North and Northwest also hired new coaches — who won’t have it easy. North won three games last year, Northwest nine. I would guess they’ll continue to struggle this season. As for South, the Titans won 15 games but lost two of the City League’s top players in Marky Nolen and Lance Russell.

Your thoughts?

by joanna

Checked in with Heights football coach Rick Wheeler this afternoon. He didn’t call me back on Monday, but I forgave him. It was a busy week with the Falcons down in Tulsa for a team camp.

Here’s what he had to say:

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by joanna

Gary Squires, an assistant at North the past two seasons, has been named the new coach. He replaces Ben Mitchell, who coached three seasons at North.

Squires is no stranger to coaching. He’s been a head coach in the City League — he was at Carroll from 1980-84 and went 30-51, he was at Kapaun from 1990-92 and was 15-29. He’s also coached at Conway Springs, Iola and Kansas City Turner.

He doesn’t have an easy road turning this program around as North was 3-18 last year and has one winning record in the past five seasons.

As for the South job, I talked to athletic director Michelle Kuhns who said she’d announce that boys job on Monday.

from Jeff Lutz

Blue Valley 9, Wichita North 2 –Nebraska signee Nate Kerkhoff outdueled Kansas State signee Matt Applegate. Kerkhoff allowed two runs in six innings.
Blue Valley scored three runs in the first, then broke open a 4-2 game with five runs in the sixth.

by joanna

Just got off the phone with Bill Faflick, the City League athletic director, and he said he had a meeting this morning at Northwest about the new nine-lane, all-weather track that is expected to be in place there by August. The work on the track will begin on Monday, while the work on Southeast’s eight-lane, all-weather track that will also service Curtis Middle School will begin a week from Monday and is expected to be finished in August. (These tracks, which replace the god-awful one at Northwest and the cinder one at Southeast, are being paid for out of the capital fund)

“I absolutely love it. We’re going to have improved facilities, desperately needed improved facilities that are quality facilities that match the quality kids and coaches we have.

“Track is the single biggest participation sport in the Wichita public schools. Our facilities are desperately in need of a face lift. We’re going to get a nine-lane track at Northwest, which will be the site for the City League track meet — nine schools, nine lanes.”

Faflick said  the long jump, triple jump and the pole vault will be taken outside the stadium, which will be safer all around.

by joanna

It didn’t take Northwest long to find a replacement for boys basketball coach Eric Hofer-Holdeman, who resigned after the season. That’s probably because Northwest didn’t have to look too far.

Athletic director J. Means said this morning that assistant Chris Collins is the Grizzlies’ new coach.

I personally like the hire. Chris is a good guy — he used to work at The Eagle back in the day — and he seems to have a similar manner as Holdeman. Pretty laid back.

When I talked to J. Means, I asked him about a couple rumors that I want to put to rest now. The first is, Northwest girls coach Jerrod Handy didn’t apply for the job. Means said that he heard the rumor so much from interested coaches who were wondering if they should even apply, so he went to Handy to ask him if he was applying. Nope.

The second rumor is concerning Jerry Gerber, who didn’t apply for the job, either. Gerber, a longtime coach at Garden Plain, was Handy’s assistant this past season. When I heard the rumor he was applying, I didn’t believe it. I mean why would Gerber come back and be a head coach at a much larger school than he’d been at previously? It just didn’t make sense.

It’s a big week in City League baseball. It’s a three team race for the 2008 City League title between North, Northwest, and Bishop Carroll.

The week was already going to be big, but we can thank Kapaun Mount Carmel for making it gigantic by defeating Northwest on Friday. So now we’ve got North with one CL loss in first place and BC and NW tied for second with a CL loss. I just love league races that come down to the final week, week-and-a-half.

Seriously, how can you not be excited about this schedule.

Today

NW vs. BC at Westurban 6:30 p.m.

Tuesday, April 29

North vs. BC at McAdams 4:30 p.m.

Wednesday, April 30

NW vs. BC at Westurban 6:30 p.m.

Tuesday, May6

NW vs. North at McAdams 4:30 p.m.

This is how it is supposed to be. The final games are suppose to mean something.

I was at BC and Heights on Friday and despite playing sloppy BC had an aire about them. They had a quite confidence that they knew they couldn’t afford to lose the game so they weren’t going to lose the game. The Golden Eagles are on a roll and if they can pick up a win tonight they’ll be flying higher than astronauts.

Northwest is in a bit of a slump. First coach Travis Stockham had to deal with certain comments about the one thing NO high school coach feels comfortable talking about - recruiting. Then the fire that destroyed several items at the school’s baseball field. Add the losses to North and KMC and it’s been a pretty restless week for Stockham I’m pretty sure.

North well they are in the driver’s seat. Target on its back like Omar, from HBO’s the Wire. The Redskins can run the table by simply winning all of their games, but if they have a slip-up here or there then they’ll be cheering for a both Northwest and BC, like those people that have the split KU-KState license plates on the front of their cars.

As I’ve typed this I just now thought about the possibility of a spoiler, but honestly outside of Heights or KMC I don’t see another team really posing a problem. No disrespect, but seriously.

So here we go. The title is up for grabs now lets see who wants it more.

Who you got?

by joanna

I just did my second coach resignation in as many days. Do these come in threes? Yesterday it was Derby girls basketball coach Bill Shaw calling it quits, although he’s coaching baseball through next season.

Today it was Northwest boys coach Eric Hofer-Holdeman. He coached the Grizzlies for 8 years and won the 6A title in 2006. He’s definitely one of my favorite coaches to deal with. He’s extremely mild-mannered and I have teased him — in print — over the years that he has the loudest clap I’ve ever heard. He used that clap and he whistled loudly to get his players attention, rarely yelling.

He obviously was a good coach, but I just liked him because he was a good man. He was enjoyable to chat with, for a story or not, and I’ll miss him. But he’s got good reasons for leaving, including spending more time with his family. You know, coaches take so much crap for people through the season — players, parents, media — more than we’ll ever know. They spend hours and hours preparing or coaching or driving kids home. And they’re certainly not well-compensated, not that they’re doing it for the money, that’s for sure. I’d say they earn pennies for every hour they coach.

Yet Hofer-Holdeman always handled things with class. I like that. I’m sure he’ll enjoy spending more time with his kids and his wife. That’s important, too.