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SPORTS TALK

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with Michael Betteridge

High school sports fans, now that the high school sports season has ended, let’s put a ribbon on the 2023-24 high school sports season with a few highlights, our local athletes of the year, and a personal July reflection.

2023-24 Season Highlights

Football

Best Cougars football game of the year: September 22, 2023: Catoctin 35 at Tuscarora 6. Logan Malachowski opens up the game with a 35-yard touchdown catch from Quarterback Haydn Matthews. Then, Hunter Bradshaw, running out of a pro power set, scores, and Jake Bell pounds in a 15-yard touchdown run to give Catoctin a 21–0 halftime lead.

In a proud historic moment for Frederick County football, Oakdale beats Linganore in the 3A State football championship. This is the first time ever that two Frederick County teams met in a State high school championship football game. Cool Oldies 1450 WTHU covered the game live on the air.

Basketball

Second year boys’ basketball Coach Zach Woodward took his team to the biggest win of the year at home against Boonsboro, where the Cougars boys basketball team had its biggest scoring output of the season for the win, 87–54. Oh yeah, and don’t forget that amazing Ben Krauss buzzer-beater at Brunswick for the win. That was spectacular! Thanks, Coach Zach, for all you did for our boys. Coach Zach has resigned. Please welcome our new head basketball coach, Coach Mike Wagner! Coach Mike is an amazing guy with tons of experience coaching all over the country and overseas. We are excited for the 2024-25 Catoctin boys basketball season.

Coach Amy Entwistle in her 20th season as the Lady Cougars basketball coach finished the season 23-4, ranking fourth in the entire 1A. What can you say about Coach Amy? She is a class act.

The Lady Cougars’ best game of the year was in the second round of the regionals at home against Surrattsville, with a domineering 55-18 win. Unfortunately, that was the same game they lost Taylor Smith to a season-ending knee injury.

Baseball

Coach Mike Franklin had an uphill task this season after graduating his two ace pitchers, Joey McMannis and Peyton Castellow, last year. Seniors Garrett Worth and Gavin Watkins took up the mantle on the pitchers mound and led their team to a first-round win in the playoffs against Boonsboro 12-2, but then in the second round, they dropped a one-run loss to eventual State 1A champion Brunswick.

To all the Cougars baseball players and coaches, you can hold your heads up high when you meet the overall state champion early in the playoffs and lose by only one run!

Softball

The Lady Cougars softball team’s biggest win of the season was against the rival Walkersville Lady Lions.  The Lions would go on to eventually battle deep into the playoffs all the way to the State semis. The Lady Cougars crushed them 21-4. It was 7-0 in the first inning! Wednesday, April 24, was the day when the entire Cougars softball season came together at home in front of their new, beautiful scoreboard against the Lady Lions. A red letter day.

We Say Goodbye To Our Senior Cougars Athletes Of The Year

Football: Haydn Matthews, Logan Malachowski, Gavin Watkins, Charles Dougherty, Wayne Ferson, Brayden Bagent, and Ethan Robeson.

Boys Basketball: Haydn Matthews, Matt Offutt, Ben Krauss, Robert Ruch Jr., Peyton Cramer, and Gavin Watkins.

Girls Basketball: Grace Williams, Sam Orndorff, Peyton Davis, and Kylie Perhach.

Boys Baseball: Ethan Georgoff, Brayden Grable, Bryont Green, Hunter Long, Patrick Morlan, David Shipton Jr., Gavin Watkins, and Garrett Worth.

Girls Softball: Meghan Gray and Raegan Miller.

Catoctin Athlete Of The Year:  Gavin Watkins

Gavin played football, basketball, and baseball from August to June! He lettered in three sports and showed the Catoctin work ethic and character of a real teammate and athlete. Thanks, Gavin!

A Personal July Reflection

For most people, July is a time to kick back and relax. July is a time for celebrations, family get-togethers, BBQs, and more. I recently spent some time out on the Potomac River, wading in the cool water, fishing and just enjoying the peace and quiet, camping out at my favorite spot. We all need to recharge our batteries, and I hope you can, too.

Check out our July COOL Oldies 1450 schedule below and stop by and say “Hi” at one of our many summer events!

SPORTS TALK

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with Michael Betteridge

Catoctin High School spring sports began with some pretty big news. With the retirement of Athletic Director Keith Bruck, who moved up north to take over at Fairfield, Catoctin began the search process for a new athletic director. 

Since WTHU arrived on the sports scene in 2008, Catoctin High School has had three great athletic directors: Tom Sherald, Kevin McMullen, and Keith Bruck. 

Sherald was a local guy all the way and Kevin McMullen was, too. Keith Bruck worked at Catoctin for 22 years, with his eye on the job all the way back to when he was assistant athletic director for eleven years, and finally landed his dream job as athletic director for the past six years. All three of these guys were local products.

Now, Catoctin has gone all the way to Waldorf, Maryland, to find its next athletic director: Brett Campbell.  Campbell, the former head basketball coach of the St. Charles Trojans, guided his team all the way to the 3A State Championship at College Park this past March, where they lost by three points to Northeast. Coach Campbell and his family have moved to Thurmont, and we welcome him into our Cougars family! A special shout-out to Coach Rich who stood in as temporary athletic director during the search process. Thanks, Coach Mike!

Spring sports are finished at Catoctin, so let’s put a ribbon on a great season.

Baseball 

What can you say about Coach Franklin and his guys. Year after year, game after game, they always “bring it.” Sitting atop the dugout, over and over again, I would smile while I listened to Coach Franklin “coaching up” his players. At times, he would laugh, at times he was stern, but he never let his players off the hook without a smile and a twinkle in his eye when he spoke to them. Every player on that team knew that Coach Franklin and his staff had their backs. 

Catoctin had some exciting bats this year. Brayden Grable batted .392 on the season, followed by Bryont Green at .340.  Castellow provided some clutch hitting, along with Jake Bell, Garrett Worth, Gavin Watkins, and Patrick Morlan. Last year, the team to beat was Clear Spring. This year, Brunswick ended the Cougars season in the regionals.

Softball 

We couldn’t help but wonder what this team would have been with Taylor Smith in the circle, but between the Cougars amazing bats and some pretty awesome pitching from Aubrey Courtney and Kassidy Kreitz, the pain of Taylor’s injury faded into the distance. 

Catoctin softball led all categories in county softball at the plate. Bralyn West had an amazing season! She led the county in hitting, with a .679 batting average and 6 homers.  Meghan Gray led the county in home runs with 10 and RBIs with 34. Kassidy Kreitz had 7 homers and 31 RBIs, second place in the county.  Courtney and Kreitz took on the role in the circle to overpower opponents for a combined 15 wins. That is not too shabby for the smallest high school in Frederick County to lead in all those categories. The Lady Cougars battled all the way to the regionals, where they ended the season against Liberty.

Lacrosse 

Catoctin boys and girls pulled the No. 3 seed in the brackets, where they both lost to Middletown—the boys in the semis, and the girls in the regional finals.

Track and Field

The Catoctin boys track team won their meet at Fort Hill in the regionals with some notable standouts.

Senior Furious Trammel captured first in the 400 meter dash, the Triple Jump, the Long Jump, and in the 4×400 meter relay with teammates Ronald Etzler, Gavin Sheetz, and Dennis Lease. Gavin Sheetz placed second in the 110 meter hurdles and third in the 300 meter hurdles.  Gabriel Riling won the 1600 and 3200 meter runs and placed second in the 800 meter run. Dennis Lease won the 800 meter run. 

The Catoctin girls track team finished eighth in their meet with a fourth place show in the 4×800 meter relay run by teammates Olivia Baker, Katelyn Bell, Anjiston Casne, and Keira Taylor.

Tennis

Finishing in the playoff brackets in singles for the boys was Zach Kerr and for the girls was Grace Bell. In boys doubles: Daniel Martin and Jackson Starliper; girls doubles: Anessa Stauffer and Lillian Holden; and in mixed doubles: Elliana Mucker and Magnus Moore.

To the Catoctin spring sports seniors, Brayden Grable, Bryont Green, Anthony Kinnamont, Patrick Morlan, David Shipton, Gavin Watkins, Garrett Worth, Charles Dougherty, Randy Hall, Alexander Hauk, Ben Krauss, Haydn Matthews, Vince Reaver, McKenna Gisrael, Malin Grongstad, Allison Kelly, Abbey Shaffer, Anessa Stauffer, Bryce Bowers, Santiago Canadas Fraga, RJ Etzler, Wayne Ferson, Anthony Kinnamount, Dennis Lease, Timothy McCarthy, Gabriel Riling, David Stitely, Furious Trammel, Meghan Gray, and Reagan Miller: Thanks for all you have done for Catoctin sports during your high school careers. May your new journey be even more successful!

SPORTS
TALK

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with Michael Betteridge

What Are They Putting In the Food at Catoctin High School?

Whatever they are feeding those kids up in Thurmont, it’s working. Two out of the four spring sports teams at Catoctin (baseball, softball, lacrosse, and tennis) are in first place, and the third team of the four, boy’s lacrosse, is in third place. All that from the smallest school in Frederick County!

The Catoctin baseball team is #1 in Frederick County and undefeated up until mid-April; the Catoctin softball team just knocked the undefeated Walkersville team out of first place in the county, with a tense 1-0 nail-biting win. The Catoctin Lady Cougars are now no.1 in Frederick County softball. The Lady Cougars will face Walkersville again at Walkersville on May 1. If you can, you probably want to make it over to Walkersville for that one.

The softball team’s average grade level is 10th grade, with two freshmen, five sophomores, and two junior starters. The team is batting .323 with a 41 percent on-base average. That means that one out of three times at the plate, they get a hit, and slightly less than half of their plate appearances produce runners on the bases. Top level college softball teams would be jealous of those stats.

And this is just the beginning! With the average age of this softball team not even in its prime yet, you can expect big things in Thurmont for the next three years under Coach Jessica Valentine who is in her 14th season at Catoctin.

Coach Valentine brought a winning tradition and legacy to this team as a former player who graduated in 2002. Coach Valentine went on to play college softball for Mars Hill University, just north of beautiful Asheville, North Carolina. One of the ways she has promoted the amazing Cougars’ legacy is with the “Wall of Fame” on the back of the Cougars softball dugout. Former players’ names and handprints are stenciled onto the concrete during homecoming. When this season’s players arrive at the field, the first thing they see are the names of winners from the recent past, like Courtney Eyler, Ashley Mayton, and Reagan Smith. They dream of some day having their name written on that sacred space. 

The Lady Cougars are an amazing softball team. Everyone on the team contributes, all the way down the roster, top to bottom. Whether its Catcher Megan Gray making backwards-diving foul ball catches at the backstop for the out, or the red-hot Taylor Smith throwing 70+mph underhand fastballs from the pitching mound, these Cougars are talented and deep. In the outfield, Maddie Ohler snags fly balls at the fence backhanded, looking over her shoulder, and then steps up to the plate and wallops a two-run homer over the fence in right center. She is joined by teammates Julie West in left field and McKenzie Lewis in right who routinely rob hitters of base hits in the outfield. At the plate, patience is a virtue, especially for third baseman Aubrie Courtney, who consistently takes opposing pitchers deep into the count to combine with her teammates for a league high 24 walks already this season. 

The infield tandem of Mazaleski at second and Reagan Smith at first base handle a lot of hot grounders, with right-handed batters swinging behind Smith’s blistering fast balls.  Over at shortstop, Kassidy Kreitz, with her cat-like reflexes, doesn’t let much get by her, and she is one of the most consistent base runners on the team. 

Meisner, Brawner, and Owens come in to relieve teammates as pinch runners and, in the field, to give the defensive starters a rest.

Just to give you some perspective on this young team: They have put up 79 runs in eight games, averaging almost 10 runs per game while only giving up 8 runs….only 1 run per game by the opposing team. That’s a 10-1 average per game.

Whatever they are feeding those kids, I’m going to invite myself to dinner because I need some of what they’ve got! Since I seem to be on a food thing, and with Cinco de Mayo just around the corner, I’ll wrap it up this way: THIS TEAM IS THE WHOLE ENCHILADA!

Catoctin Athletes Take the Next Step

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BLAIR GARRETT

Nine Catoctin High School (CHS) seniors officially signed on to further their education while playing sports at the next level. All nine athletes excelled in their sports, helping to propel each of their teams and teammates to be better every day. CHS held a signing day ceremony to let the head coaches share with the athletes’ friends and families what kind of competitor and person they’ve seen each player blossom into.

Few people in a high school athlete’s life see the growth and development that a coach does. The students who go on to compete in college are among the most driven and dedicated to keep improving each day, and a good coach takes notice of that. Each one of these athletes has put an exceptional amount of time into their craft. Putting in the hours on the fields, courts, tracks, and in the gym, coupled with a good attitude, can take you a long way, and each one of these student-athletes has demonstrated that day after day.

Football: Wyatt Davis has committed to play at Shippensburg University in the fall, and the Raiders will be lucky to have him. Davis played defensive end and tackle for Catoctin and was a driving force on the defensive line.

Track and Field: Jenna Zentz is taking her talents to Towson University, where she will look to continue her successes on the track. Zentz ran a variety of events for the Cougars, including relays and 100- through 800-meter races.

Baseball: A pair of star athletes, Noland Kinna and Dalton Williams, have signed their letters of intent to play ball in college, and both have meant a tremendous deal to CHS during their time playing there. Kinna, a commit to the College of Southern Maryland, was involved in a myriad of school programs, and he became a key piece to Catoctin’s back-to-back great seasons. Williams will go on to play at High Point University. Both players were part of the state championship winning season in 2021, helping CHS grab its second championship title.

Softball: Catoctin softball’s Kara Watkins and Avery Sickeri have been integral in the team’s phenomenal season. From start to finish, the Cougars have been dominant, with Watkins and Sickeri helping the team capture the Central Maryland Conference Championship en route to a 17-2 season. Watkins is set to join Shenandoah University’s softball team, while Sickeri looks to make waves at West Chester University.

Girls Basketball: With a talent-packed lineup and a lot of hard work, seniors Emma Wivell and Emily Williams helped push Catoctin to the state finals in the team’s 23-3 season. The seniors had great individual accomplishments as well, with Wivell making the Maryland Basketball Coaches Association (MBCA) 1st team, and Williams making the MBCA 2nd team. Wivell has committed to Salisbury University while Williams has committed to Shenandoah University.

Boys Basketball: Though the team had a rocky season, Catoctin’s Ryan Burke played a key role in the successes the boys had over the course of the season. Burke, a shooting guard, plans to play next season with Hagerstown Community College, and will look to make an impact just as he did with the Cougars.

Congratulations to all graduating seniors and to the student athletes who put in years of effort to take their careers to the next step. 

(above) Avery Sickeri and Coach Jessica Valentine.

(above) Kara Watkins, family, and coaching staff.

(above) CHS Principal Jennifer Clements addresses the student athletes.

(avove) Noland Kinna (seated left) and Dalton Williams (seated right) with CHS baseball team.

(above seated) Wyatt Davis and Jenna Zentz are shown.

(above) Emma Wivell and Emily WIlliams.

Sports Previews for Spring

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Blair Garrett

As temperatures rise, the snow begins to melt, and February comes to a close, high school spring sports will be kicking into high gear.

A cast of new athletes are coming in to provide Catoctin High athletics spring sports teams with the energy, drive, and dedication to be successful on and off the field. Catoctin spring sports include: boys baseball, girls softball, boys and girls lacrosse, and tennis.

Baseball. The Cougars look to improve on last season’s 6-4 record. The team has multiple matchups versus Boonsboro and Brunswick on its plate, which may be the deciding factor for the success of Catoctin High’s season. With a crop of talented athletes across the field, Catoctin Baseball appears to have another strong season in the works. The season tees off  March 21, against familiar foe Gov. Thomas Johnson.

Softball. Catoctin Softball’s 11-4 2018 season was a smashing success, and the team hopes to replicate its winning ways for the 2019 campaign. The team was bounced by the Bohemia Manor Eagles in the Maryland Girls Softball State Championships, but the Cougars’ trail back to the playoffs runs through its rivalry games early in the season.

Boys Lacrosse. Catoctin Lacrosse struggled across the board last season, but with a fresh team, fresh year, and a fresh mindset, the boys head into the 2019 season with the goal to continue improving. Getting off to a strong start might make the difference for the Cougars. The team kicks off its season in an away game on March 26 against Gov. Thomas Johnson.

Girls Lacrosse. After a rough previous season, Catoctin Girls Lacrosse has its sights set on a new start, as the team kicks off its season versus North Hagerstown on March 21. A win in the first game of the season could turn the tides and build confidence for the team moving forward.

Tennis. Catoctin Tennis kicks off with back-to-back matches March 21 and March 22 in back-to-back exhibition matches against local rivals, Boonsboro and Linganore. The team will look to get back into the win column after its hot start last season.

Signing Ceremony at Catoctin High School

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Theresa Dardanell

Catoctin High School (CHS) athletes who signed up to attend  colleges and universities in the fall.

 

Football: Will Bingman, Clarion University; Joey Fogle, Gettysburg College.

 

Soccer: Noah Olson, Frederick Community College.

 

Baseball: Ryan Fisher, Mount St. Mary’s University; Dylan Reid, Hagerstown Community College; Nick Ford, Frederick Community College; Brett Weatherly, Fairmont State University; Connor Cramer, Fairmont State University.

 

Lacrosse: Colin Webb, Messiah College; Brenden Bozick, Frederick Community College; Sam Staley, Frederick Community College.

 

Softball: Lizzie Dougherty, Frederick Community College; Taylor Beckley, Frederick Community College; Maddie Krantz, Penn State.

 

A ceremony was held at CHS on May 23, 2018, to recognize the athletes. Assistant Athletic Director Keith Bruck introduced the coaches, Paul Dumars, Rob Phelan, Mike Franklin, and Neil Metzgar, who praised and congratulated the students. An enthusiastic crowd of parents, families, friends, and fellow students attended the event.

Pictured are ten of the student athletes recognized during the signing ceremony at Catoctin High School. Pictured left to right are Brett Weatherly, Dylan Reid, Nick Ford, Ryan Fisher, Connor Cramer, Joey Fogle, Will Bingman, Colin Webb, Brendan Bozick, and Noah Olson. Unavailable for photo: Sam Staley, Lizzie Dougherty, Taylor Beckley, and Maddie Krantz.

Photo by Theresa Dardanell