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KOKOMO HIGH SCHOOL Athletic Department | 765-455-8053
NICK SALE | Athletic Director
Twitter: @KHS_AD
www.kokomoathletics.com
THE VOICE OF WILDKAT ATHLETICS
Athletic Schedule of Events
August 13, 2021
7:00 p.m…...V FB at Zionsville (Scrimmage)
August 14, 2021
8:00 a.m…..V G Golf at Western Invite
6:00 p.m…..V GSOC at Western
7:30p.m…...V BSOC at Western
SCOREBOARD
T he Kokomo High School Athletic Department welcomes back our loyal followers for another exciting school year of KHS Athletics. The past two school years have presented
challenges for everyone, but we were incred-ibly proud to complete all athletic seasons during the 2020-2021 school year. Our coaches and student-athletes did an amaz-ing job following guidelines and taking the necessary precautions to allow our athletes to participate in their events. I also want to thank our fans for their support and for being so flexible with the many changes that were necessary to ensure the safety of our stu-dents and staff. Our hope is that things re-turn to some normalcy this season and that we can welcome our Wildkat fans back to the grandstands … starting with our first home football game vs. Western next Friday, August 20
th.
Some last-minute scheduling changes
may be necessary, so I encourage our Wildkat fans to closely follow our athletic webpage (www.kokomoathletics.com) and Twitter (KHS_AD) for up-to-date scheduling information.
Next, I would like to send a special Thank You to Terry Downham, who has
retired as Sports Information Director at Kokomo High School after 37 years. Those Wildkat fans who know Terry, realize that Terry was the best SID in Indi-ana. The countless hours Terry spent creating Kat Chatter and disseminating information to our coaches and fans was unmatched. Again, Thank You, Terry, for all that you have done for Kokomo Athletics. We know that you will still be helping out, but Thank You for all your SID work thus far, while helping to make Kokomo Athletics what it is today.
We are very excited to welcome Dean Hockney to our team as our new Ko-
komo High School Sports Information Director. If you have had the privilege of
meeting Dean, you know how much he loves Kokomo High School and Kokomo High School Athletics. We are so lucky to add his background knowledge of Koko-mo, as well as his journalism skills, to our KHS Athletics team.
Thankfully, Missy Newton is back as our Athletic Secretary this school year. An-
yone who calls, or stops by our office, knows how pleasant, helpful, and talented, Missy is; and Missy truly keeps our Athletic Department moving in the right direc-tion. I couldn’t possibly name all the outstanding staff and support staff in our Ath-letic Department, but I feel fortunate to be able to work with so many professional, and caring people, daily.
The North Central Conference (NCC) still is comprised of two divisions (East
and West) for all team sports, except Football (round robin) and Basketball (all schools play each other to determine conference champions). The East Division consists of Anderson, Indianapolis Arsenal Tech, Marion, Muncie Central, and Richmond, while the West Division features Kokomo, Harrison, Lafayette Jeff, Lo-gansport, and McCutcheon. Division standings help seed the conference tourna-ments at the end of the season. Last year the NCC had several teams make long runs in state tournaments. We feel our outstanding competition, as well as the con-ference tournament experiences, help our NCC teams immensely.
We are excited about our returning student-athletes and coaching staffs, and
are looking forward to successful conference campaigns and IHSAA tournament series this school year. Our Wildkat student-athletes are easy to cheer for because they are great KHS representatives. Our students and coaches have been working hard the last 6 weeks, and we look forward to a great start this Fall.
Remember to pick up your All Sports tickets, which are still on sale. I look for-
ward to seeing you at our Kokomo High School Athletics events this school year. If you have any questions, please feel free to call us at 455-8053 or email me at [email protected].
Have a great school year, and we will see you at the games. Go Wildkats! Nick Sale Athletic Director
GIRLS GOLF
T his year for the girl’s golf program, we are coming into the season by re-building our team! I am excited to say that half of our team is new to the game but are more than excited to be playing! We spent this summer
getting to know each other and now this team has an inseparable bond. I am ex-cited to see where the season takes us.
Our returning players are Layla Andrysiak, who is our senior this year, playing in
our number two spot! I’ve been coaching Layla for 4 years now and have loved every second of it. She has really improved and always brings positivity to the team. Elizabeth Lytle is our junior, who is playing our number one. She has made many improvements to her game. Her goal this year is to make it to state! Our last returning player is junior, Kamryn Hahn, who has also improved and has grown to love the game. She will play our number 3 position this year. These girls are going to be great leaders for our new players.
Our new players are Brileigh Quillen-Popejoy (sophomore), Mara Dechert
(freshman), Sam McClelland (freshman), and Matilda Stout (freshman). These 4 bring such positive attitudes to the course and are excited to learn the game. Brileigh will be playing our 4th spot.
Our team goal this year is to make it out of
sectionals as a team. I believe we can achieve it with hard work! Overall, I am excited to get the season going! Come check out the team at the Kokomo Country Club this year!
-Coach Kern
BOYS TENNIS I
'm extremely proud and humbled to be the new varsity boys tennis coach at Koko-mo. I was so fortunate to play for Coach Charlie Hall in the late 90's. He will al-ways be my all-time favorite coach and I learned so much from him. I have such
fond memories of the tennis season and the teammates I had at KHS! I was also blessed to have a year with Coach Flanery, who taught me so much about the game and building a tennis program. I love the Wildkats and am honored to be coaching these great student-athletes.
Our two central themes this year are love and effort. Both of these are completely un-
der our control. We are called to love our school, teammates and even our opponents by putting others ahead of ourselves. We also believe that we can always give perfect ef-fort! I'm so thankful that coach Brett Heflin is a part of the program as an assistant. The boys have bought into our team goals and have already created a family culture through our team.
We have experienced a lot of transition from last year, but that has created some tre-
mendous opportunities for younger players. We are led by captain Caleb Wallace, sen-ior, who has stepped up to lead this team through the off-season. He will anchor a #1 doubles team. We have some bright young talent at singles, led by (Soph) Andrew Guerre who has really improved his game through hard work. Joining him at singles will be (Soph) Jayleb Walsh and (Jr) Kye Gamble. The rest of our doubles is a work in pro-gress but (Sr) Isaac Elkins, (Soph) Ari Leger, (Soph) Chad Washburn and (Jr) Alan Dockemeyer all have a chance of making the varsity line-up. We have some solid ath-letes who like working hard.
Seniors Lucas Cummings and Drake Hester are perfect members of our team! Their
hard work, superior character and servant leadership are great examples to younger players. Our JV team will also consist of Juniors Blake Acord and Ashton Sexton and Sophomores Sean Kursinsky and William Nelson. Our middle school program is loaded with talented depth and great coaches too which will help us rebuild this season.
Go Kats! Coach Taflinger
BOYS CROSS COUNTRY T
he boy’s cross-country team is excited to embark on the 2021 season, as we look to improve off last season. This season we have 14 boys out for the team, which the most we have had in the 3 years that I have been the
coach. That is good news for our team, as more and more kids begin to get interest-ed in the sport and we are starting to build some depth.
This season we will be led by senior Collin Keesling, who was a regional qualifier
last season. This will be the third season Collin has been on the team and he has gotten better each season. The goal is that he takes the next step in his development and can advance farther in the state tournament. Collin has done a nice job this sum-mer and at the start of the school year leading our new and younger runners.
Our other returning runners this season will be senior Isaac Elkin, junior Noah
Thompson, and sophomore Adam Kemper. All three of these boys are looking to im-prove off last year and all have done a nice job this summer working towards that goal.
Joining these four young men will be ten new Wildkat runners. They are made up
of senior Joao Barros, juniors Parker Cage and Amadeusz Alcalde, sophomores An-drew Heath and Travis Kewley, as well as freshmen Kelton Serra, Andrew Anderson, Connor Frederick, Gabrial Newland, and Kolton Hueston. These athletes have shown some promise so far this summer and I am hopefully that they will continue to show improvement as they embark on their first cross country season for the Wildkats.
Our team goals are to compete and improve each meet, so that we will be ready in
October when the NCC and IHSAA Tournament begins. We have a challenging schedule and know we will face difficulties, but we are eager to face and work to overcome those obstacles.
We are looking forward to getting our season under way and we hope you will
come check us out at a race this season. Our first meet will be Tuesday, August 17th at the Northwestern Combine at 5:30pm.
GO KATS! Coach Ousley
GIRLS CROSS COUNTRY T
he 2021 Lady Kats Cross Country team is going to be returning five of the seven girls on our varsity squad from last season. It is exciting to see a lot of familiar faces with a team full of girls who are going to work hard and are fully willing to challenge them-
selves each day. I am really looking forward to seeing the vast improvements that they will make over the course of their cross country season.
We will be led by senior 5k school record holder and 2020 North Central Conference (NCC)
individual champion, Julynne Spidell this season. She is coming off a 2021 track season which she qualified for the IHSAA State meet in the 3200m, and she is ready to begin her journey to the IHSAA State meet in cross country. Julynne is off to a great start for the season and is focused on improving each week to reach her lofty personal goals.
Our four other returning runners from last year are seniors, Bri Bautista and Kylie Lewis, jun-
ior Emma Nelson, and sophomore Leah Mitchell will be vital to our team success this season. These four young ladies will need to push each other throughout mileage days, interval workouts, and races. They will also need to be leaders for the new runners on our team. We need them to close our gap time between Julynne and them to less than five minutes by the end of the season. I am confident that they can do this if they stay positive and trust the process. Each of these run-ners can cut two or three minutes from their personal best from last season.
We will have four rookies this season, senior Mariana Ribeiro, and juniors Maria Nasimoto,
Manuela Marques, and Miyoko Hill who will be competing to round out our varsity team to start off our season. These girls have so much potential, and it will be nice to see their confidence grow throughout the first few weeks of the season. This group is full of competitors that are deter-mined and motivated to make our varsity team.
We are also thrilled to have Hall of Fame Coach Ricke Stucker back to help our team as an
assistant coach in his 53rd year of coaching. He has been a staple of the running community in the area and throughout Indiana. Coach Stucker is the most dedicated and caring coach that I have ever met, and he will have an enormous impact on our young ladies throughout the season.
The Kokomo Lady Kats cross country team will need to stay focused and be competitors. Our
returning runners will be expected to take a big step forward this season. We will continue to im-prove as a team and will strive to peak for our North Central Conference (NCC) meet and during the tournament. Our team of young runners will gain some valuable experience that will help them in the future. This season will be an adventure full of growth. Go Lady Kats!
-Coach Salinas
VOLLEYBALL
L ady Wildkat Volleyball is back in action this fall. With four Sen-iors graduating last year, there are big shoes to fill on the court. However, Senior returners Jada Claire Broomfield and Jalynn
Warden will help to lead the charge on the court, with guest appearanc-es from Athynn Smith and Hallie Ramirez. Returning sophomore, Abby Hansen, will also help to add volleyball knowledge as well as a strong middle attack. Keihera Lang will be back in action blocking some oppo-nents at the net. Sophomore Mia Federspill will step into the setting po-sition, while sophomore Dani Tate will return as a hitter in Haworth Gym.
We have a lot of newcomers to the program this year: sophomores
Taylor Reed, Helen Qui, and Alyseea Thompson, and freshman Kinley Martin, Regan McClain, and Aubrey McGraw.
This season we are working to
build our volleyball knowledge and compete consistently. While young, we have a solid group of athletes that can make athletic plays. We are ex-cited to be back in action and hope you will be able to come see a game.
Coach Hachet
FOOTBALL T
he Kokomo Wildkats are looking forward to getting the 2021 campaign underway. We return a lot of familiar faces in some key skill positions and also have a few new starters up front! We still will be leading off the season with Western HS.
Everyone is fired to play them and we are looking forward to having a great support from the community and student body. The beginning of the year we are the road for three of the first four weeks. We finish the year with a home stand with four of five games at Walter Cross Sta-dium.
Offensively we will be in a familiar look. Our famous double
wing offense known through out the nation will be making a re-turn. Running the ball will obviously be what we hang our hat on, but I think we will have a strong ariel attack to back up the run game. Up front starting for the Kats and leading the way will be John Curl, Dakota Gunter, George Montes, Dre Lewis, Kadin Dempsey, Charlie Groves, and Camden Horner. In the back field we will be led by Evan Barker at quarterback. Plez Lawrence, Ta’Shy Stewart, Shayne Spear, and Trey Marciniak will lead the rushing attack.
Defensively the Kats will still play with the fast paced attacking mentality led by Coach
Spear calling the shots on the defensive side of the ball! Up front Tyreese Tucker, Nate Blackamore, Brandon Bennett, and Kymani Howard will be our guys that lead the way up front. At linebacker Shayne Spear, Evan Barker, and Tracy Dowling will be our down hill run stoppers. In the secondary Dre Kirby, Ta’Shy Stewart, Keegan Name, Jaylin Cannon, and Reese Beard will be our guys defending the pass! We will have lots of speed and ath-lete on the field running around.
The kicking game will be manned by Cole Boruff, Diego Giner, and Ta’Shy Stewart!
These guys all have big legs and can change field position on our opponents all year long. We are looking forward to having the stadium back at 100% capacity! Hopefully we
can have a successful year and everyone will back our football team this fall! Thank you for the continued support. We open the season at home on August 20th and 7:00 p.m. Buy your tickets in advance in the athletic office! See you there.
Go Kats! Coach Colby
BOYS SOCCER V
arsity Head Coach Aaron Blessing begins his sixth year leading the program this season (125 wins in 15 seasons as a head coach, 23-49-1 in five seasons at KHS), and he looks for growth in several areas.
There are several solid performers and strong leaders on the team this season. In the goal, talented Jr. Co-Captain Joey McConnell (2nd Team All NCC in ‘19 and 1st Team All NCC in ‘20) has developed into a leader of the back line. His command of the box will help new starters and players new to the program gel into a cohesive unit. In the back line, several players will help turn the Wildkat fortunes in a positive direction. Juniors Son Soekim and Gabe Booher are complemented by soph-omore AJ Blessing and Senior Eduardo Capetillo. The back five will be a formidable defensive unit.
In midfield, Cole Boruff (Sr.) and Ben Herrera (Fr.) will provide physical play and dynamic playmaking while playing alongside winger RJ Robinson (Jr.). Seniors Aaron Galles, Travarion Corbin, and Micah Lamberson will also play in midfield wing positions.
Up front, Co-Captain and second team all NCC performer Kieran Morrison (Sr.) and Diego Giner-Jiminez will provide dynamic playmaking and improve on last season’s goal output.
With a slate that begins August 14 by traveling to Western, the Wildkats will be tested early and often. The Wildkats begin the season visiting Western, and then travel to coun-ty foe Eastern, a team they have not played since 2018. The Wildkats host Muncie Cen-tral to open conference play, and after a tussle with Northwestern, the Harrison Raiders come calling. Other challenging matchups include conference foes McCutcheon and Lo-gansport and non-conference foe Westfield.
Coach Blessing
GIRLS SOCCER I
am thrilled to be the new Varsity Head Coach and back on the pitch doing what I love. Some of my best childhood memories involved playing soccer and continued through college. As I embark on my first season leading the Lady Kat’s program, I feel so lucky to work with this
group of extraordinary young ladies. They are role models on and off the field. The team has been working very hard during the off-season, getting in shape, getting to know each other, and preparing for a new season together.
Our coaching staff has brought great energy and enthusiasm to the game and our team. Our new
Assistant and Junior Varsity Coach is Addy Takacs. She is a Kokomo alum and brings outstanding soccer and training knowledge. Aaron Casler is our new assistant coach and has stepped right in and is such an asset to our team with his soccer knowledge and love for the game and competition. Pat Robertson has been an assistant coach for the Lady Kats for five years and has provided great calm and reassurance with the new coaching transitions. The ladies are working hard and adjusting well to the change in the coaching staff.
A highlight of the summer was Middle School and Youth Soccer camp. The players did an out-
standing job being the coaches for the week and leading the young players in our community. The La-dy Kat’s also hosted their 1st annual Alumni Game that was a huge success. It was great to see past players come together to help our current players get ready for the season.
We have a core of solid seniors and a good group of underclassmen. The willingness to learn new
plays, positions, and situations show that all the ladies are invested in making our team better. Our team motto is, We Before Me. We are learning how to play for each other and the good of the team. We have a strong senior class that leads on the field and in the classroom. The leadership we have on this team is exciting and runs deep. Our offensive captains will be Nicole Burdette, Kate Mayfield, and Emily Riggle. The defensive captains will be Rebecca Stillwell, Rilyn Wonnell, and Molly Dowden.
Our defense is led by our goalkeeper Maddie Carpenter and seniors Rebecca Stillwell, Rilyn Won-
nell, Molly Dowden, and Mariana Rodriguez de la Gala Ramos. In the midfield, it will be exciting to watch Nicole Burdette and Kate Mayfield control the middle and
make plays happen using our quick and skilled Left Midfielder Sophomore Ellen Callane and sea-soned and aggressive right midfielder Senior Emily Riggle. Upfront, there will be a variation of fun and aggressive players to watch. We will have senior Corrine Stone, senior Brianna Bautista, and sopho-more Kamryn Boone to complete the forward line.
Our Junior Varsity Team is full of up-and-coming players as we have a solid freshman class along
with a great core group of sophomores who are working hard and improving with every practice. The Lady Kats will be traveling to Western High School on Saturday, August 15 at 6:00pm to kick off the season!
Coach Elizabeth Rayl
NEXT WEEK IN SPORTS
