Men’s Swimming
Fan favorite Michael Phelps returns for what may be his last Olympic cycle to compete in five events. Phelps collected eight medals in the 2004 games in Athens and another eight in Beijing, winning more individual medals than any other athlete at both games. He holds the records for most gold medals won at a single Games (eight) and highest total gold medals won by a single athlete (14). At 16 individual medals overall, Phelps is just three away from breaking Soviet gymnast Larisa Latynina’s record for the most individual Olympic medals of any athlete in history.

Women’s Swimming
Missy Franklin, 17, qualified for her first Olympics this year. Though she’s new to the Games, Franklin has entered the swimming world with a splash; at the 2012 Olympic trials, she broke Team USA veteran Natalie Coughlin’s American record in the 100-meter backstroke. She took her first five international medals home in the 2011 World Championships, competing alongside Coughlin, and broke two world records in 2011.

Men’s Track & Field
Jamaica’s Usain Bolt, five-time world champion and three-time Olympic gold medalist, is considered easily the fastest man in the world. He currently holds the international records for both the 100-meter and 200-meter races. Before Bolt, the U.S.’s own Tyson Gay held the 100-meter sprint title. Gay, with three world golds under his belt, has one of the most decorated records in running history but has yet to medal at an Olympic Games. He’ll be looking to change that this summer when he faces Bolt.

Women’s Track & Field
Carmelita Jeter, a sprinter who specializes in the 100-meter dash, is the second-fastest woman to ever compete in the event, topping Marion Jones’ best time and nearing the all-time world record held by Florence Griffith-Joyner since 1987. Jeter currently holds three of the 10 best times in history run by a female athlete in the 100-meter race. At the 2012 U.S. Olympic Trials, Jeter finished first in the event and will head to London this summer to go for the gold.

Men’s Wrestling
Jordan Burroughs, a freestyle wrestler from New Jersey, boasts a competition record that speaks for itself: the up-and-comer has won every tournament he has entered in the last three years. Claiming the top spot in the 2011 World Championships, the 2011 Pan American games and the 2011 NCAA Championship, Burroughs became the fourth wrestler in history to win both the world and NCAA titles in a single year.

Women’s Beach Volleyball
Many in the sports world have deemed dynamic duo Kerri Walsh and Misty May-Treanor the greatest beach volleyball team of all time. The pair competed together in the 2004 and 2008 summer Olympics, taking home the gold both times. May-Treanor is also the most successful current women’s beach volleyball player in the world, holding 110 individual championship wins in national and international competitions.

Women’s Tennis
Superstar sisters Serena and Venus Williams will compete alongside each other after a strong year in competition. Both women have held the title of No. 1 female tennis player in the world several times in the last 10 years and have continued to dominate international tournaments, including this month’s Wimbledon.

Men’s Basketball
The Miami Heat’s LeBron James has been the center of attention in the world of men’s basketball since he became the No. 1 NBA draft pick in 2003 at age 18. In 2008, the guard/forward helped lead Team USA to victory, securing the team gold in the Beijing summer Games. The American basketball legend will aim for a repeat show this year in London.

Women’s Soccer
31-year-old Abby Wambach led the U.S. women’s soccer team to a gold medal victory in Athens 2004, but missed the opportunity to compete in Beijing four years later due to a leg injury. Having come back strong in 2011 to compete in her third FIFA Women’s World Cup, scoring 13 goals to become the U.S.’s lead scorer in the tournament, Wambach will get another shot in London this summer.

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“The season’s been going well so far,” he said. “We had a great fall. I can’t be more optimistic. We have a great group of guys together, really hard working. I have no doubts that I’m going to come back healthy and play well. We have a great vibe on our team right now, and we’re in a winning mood.”

Curtis Roby is captain of the Dartmouth men’s tennis team. Photo by Andrew Schwartz

Roby, a native Upper East Sider and graduate of the Trinity School, picked up tennis when he was 11 and has been playing at a high level ever since, though he feels that he didn’t truly hit his peak until college. During his first two years at Dartmouth, he finished 30-20 in singles and 27-21 in doubles. Now the team captain, he’s focused on maintaining that winning record.

“College sports is certainly a lot more intense than what I was used to in high school,” Roby said. “Being on a team and facing so much pressure every match is a little different, but I definitely embrace that.”

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Cross Country—Of all the fall sports, none had more locals competing in college than cross country. The honor roll of runners started in the city, where Natoya Bromfield (LaGuardia) finished 16th for Hunter College at the City University of New York Athletic Conference (CUNYAC) Championships. Former high school teammates Khrystyna Uhlitskykh and Elizabeth Messina were 21st and 36th, respectively, competing for Brooklyn College. Caroline Chung completed the local LaGuardia contingent, finishing 43rd for Lehman, where Shane King (Environmental Studies) was on the men’s roster. Jeannette Dobosz (Martin Luther King) of St. Francis was 63rd at the Northeastern Conference Championships. Jena Ko, the only other LaGuardia graduate running, was 21st at the SUNY Tech Invitational and 66th at the Liberty League Championships for William Smith.

In the Ivy League, UPenn’s Jeff Weinstein (Dalton) was 65th at the Iona Meet of Champions and 88th at the Heptagonal Championships. Teammate Joe Myrie (Collegiate) placed 113th at the rather pessimistically named Fordham Fiasco. Brian Hill (Regis) was 29th for Harvard at a dual meet with Yale. Dylan Trotzuk was also on the Crimson’s roster, while Dwayne Alexis, another Collegiate alumnus, ran for Dartmouth.

Other former Collegiate runners included Villanova’s Chris Williams, Hamilton’s Hashem Zikry and Ges Adams, who was a captain for Vassar and placed sixth at the Steven Invitational and 43rd at the Albany Invitational. Among his teammates were Rafael Ricaurte (Regis), who finished 21st at the Stevens meet, and William Healy (Loyola), who nabbed 112th place at the NCAA Atlantic Regionals.

The running alumni from Hunter were also numerous. Dan Stair was 120th at the Main Line Invitational for Swarthmore, while Sam Ghitleman competed for Oberlin and finished 14th at the Wooster Invitational and 77th at the North Coast Athletic Conference Championships. At Tufts, Kirsten Brown was 67th at the Trinity Invitational. Her teammate Tina Milburn (Chapin) finished inside the top 200 at the Boston Mayor’s Cup.

Two Brearley alumnae ran for Bowdoin. Skyler Walley placed 37th in a dual meet against Bates, and Christina Argueta placed 44th at the New England Small College Athletic Conference (NESCAC) Championships, 54th at the New England Division 3 Championships and fifth in the Maine State Championships. She was also named to the NESCAC All-Academic Team. Sophie Haas, another Brearley graduate, competed for Grinnell, finishing 166th at the Wartburg Invitational.

Haas’ teammate Sasha Dunbar (Beacon) was 21st at the Midwest Conference Championships, and 126th at the NCAA Central Regionals. Sarah Wenger, who also formerly ran for Beacon, was 11th at the Bard Invitational for SUNY New Paltz.

Luke Willert (Dalton) and Brandon Whitaker (St. Agnes) both ran well as freshmen. The former was 74th at the West Region Preview Meet for Pomona, while the latter was 57th at the Stevens Invitational for Concordia.

Finally, a trio of seniors wrapped up their college careers well. SUNY Old Westbury’s Hakiem George (Life Sciences) earned 39th place at Stevens, Natalia Drozdiak (UNIS) was 18th at the Purchase Invitational for Bard and Bucknell’s Baron Willeford (Columbia Prep) was 31st at the Patriot League Championships and 116th at the NCAA Mid-Atlantic Regionals.

Volleyball—Once again, CUNY schools benefited tremendously from local Manhattan volleyball players. At York, Norman Thomas alumnae Emely Vasquez and Sashe Almonte made big impacts as freshmen. Vasquez started 24 matches and recorded 36 kills, 13 assists, 26 aces, 122 digs and nine blocks, while Almonte started 16 matches and produced 20 kills, 21 aces, 67 digs and 13 blocks. Another Norman Thomas graduate, Rodesha Donaldson, played in 35 matches for Hunter, tallying 25 kills, 20 assists, 41 aces and 165 digs. City Tech’s Stephanie Novas (Art and Design) started all 18 matches and had 28 kills, 16 assists, 14 aces and 21 digs. And at Brooklyn College, Thea Schlieben (Rudolf Steiner) played 21 matches and recorded 22 kills, 16 assists, 14 aces and 69 digs.

Freshmen Adelynn Shreffler and Hannah Cassius competed at upstate colleges. Shreffler (Brearley), who played nine times for Skidmore, notched 11 digs, while Cassius (LaGuardia) played 17 times at Vassar and produced 28 assists, five aces and 63 digs.

Farther afield, there were four locals playing in the NESCAC. They included Amherst’s Mary Reiser (Nightingale), Connecticut College’s Jamie Honohan (Marymount), Middlebury’s Charlotte Heilbronn (Spence) and Bowdoin’s Victoria Edelman (Trinity). Honohan had nine digs in seven matches, Heilbronn recorded 10 digs in four matches and Edelman played 27 times and contributed 120 kills, 30 assists, 10 aces, 34 digs and 51 blocks.

Out in Ohio, Lizzie Orfaly (Fieldston) was a libero for Oberlin and put together nine aces and 113 digs in 23 matches. At rival Kenyon, Meggie Strew (Trevor Day) had 10 aces and 15 digs.

Football—In varsity play, Peter Eames (Riverdale) had the only statistical contribution, playing in three games for Hamilton and breaking up a pass. Three others didn’t get into a game but were on their teams’ rosters: Greg Barton (Dalton) at Washington and Lee, Terence Mooney (Hunter) at Kenyon and Columbia’s Dan Cohen (Horace Mann).

In sprint football, David Jean-Baptiste (Regis) had one catch for 24 yards, one forced fumble and one recovered fumble for Princeton. The Marin Brothers (Riverdale) played at UPenn, with Jordan getting one tackle and Jason running 130 yards on 19 carries.

Other Sports—Mount Holyoke’s Nicole Nounou (Horace Mann) played one game for the field hockey team. And at Vassar Hal Moore (Hunter) Guillermo Farias (UNIS) and Matthew Elisofon (Trevor Day) were members of the rugby squad.

Four years, 472 games—a whole lot of volleyball. Jang has accomplished it all by carving out a spot for himself as a libero, the defensive specialist who is not allowed to make attacking shots. While the stars at the nets rack up the spikes, he’s in the backcourt making the gritty, unnoticed plays.

“Every time I play, I try to be a stabilizing and unifying force on the team,” Jang said. “As libero, you have to be very consistent all the time. It can be the most important position in terms of dictating how the team plays. A lot of it is the mind-set that you’re not going to let anything touch the ground and have the aggressiveness to sacrifice your body and keep the play going.”

Hunter College High School graduate Eugene Jang holds the record for games played, both in a season and a career, at MIT.

Jang picked up the game seven years ago in 9th grade at Hunter College High School. On a team with modest height, he actually played as an outside hitter.

“It helped a lot that my high school coaches were really into it,” Jang said. “They got me to play for club teams and go to the Empire State Games.”

At MIT, playing up at the net was no longer an option for the 5-foot-8 Jang. He simply didn’t have the vertical reach to play against opponents who towered over him. But without much of a hitch, he made the transition to defensive specialist. This season, he recorded 334 digs while playing in every match and game as MIT went 25-12. Jang was also named for the second time to the Northeast College Volleyball Association’s (NECVA) All-Academic Team.

“It definitely became a different game in college,” he said. “I feel like I would much rather be the libero on a really good team than playing outside for a team that isn’t very strong. I enjoyed contributing to a team where the talent level was so high. This team this year was the best team I’ve ever played on, so it was a good way to go out.”

There were only three other locals who played college volleyball this winter, but their achievements were impressive. At Baruch, Eryk Kowalski (Environmental Studies) played in all 40 matches as a middle blocker for a team that finished 35-10, won the CUNY Athletic Conference Championship and reached the semifinals of the NECVA Championship. He recorded 265 kills, 12 assists, 25 aces, 77 digs and 137 blocks. Brendan Feng (Hunter) appeared in 18 matches as a freshman at Hunter College and had 55 assists. And at City College, Ramy Abdalla (Beacon) wrapped up his collegiate career as an outside hitter.

Squash—More squash talent comes out of New York than any other place in the country, and the powerhouse programs were packed as usual with local players. Harvard had Quinn and Zander Auerbach (both Collegiate) on the men’s team and Emily Park (Horace Mann) and Bree Sterne (Chapin) on the women’s team. Park was named a Second Team All-American after going 10-4 while playing between the second and fourth slots. Other Ivy League players included Blair Ligelis (Chapin) at Princeton, which won the national championship; Katherine Ettinger (Brearley) at Yale; and Jen Chu (Chapin) at Cornell.

Williams’ Julie Reiser (Brearley) played at the ninth spot and made her conference’s All-Academic Team. At Amherst, Caroline Dreyspool (Chapin) finished 4-13 at Nos. 8 and 9. Victoria Barba (Nightingale) was a First Team All-Conference player in her senior season at Tufts, where she played at the top of the lineup. And at Hamilton, James Hogan (Regis) was 9-13 while splitting time between the second, third and fourth spots. Julia Penrose (Spence) also played for Hamilton.

Finally, Christopher Berry (Dwight), John Gillespie (York Prep) and Andrew Rolfe (Riverdale) all played at Franklin & Marshall.

Swimming—Few local swimmers performed as well as Valeriya Varpakhovich (LaGuardia) did at Queens College. The senior was named Honorable Mention all-conference in the 200-yard medley relay, 800 freestyle relay and 400 free relay. At the Metropolitan Conference Championships, she finished 26th in the freestyle mile and 23rd in the 400 individual medley (IM). Tara Meiners, a former teammate of Varpakhovich’s at LaGuardia, swam for the College of Staten Island and finished fourth in the 200 backstroke at the CUNYAC Championships. She also helped the 400 free relay team finish third and won five individual races and five relays during the season. Other LaGuardia graduates now swimming in college included Tanaka Nyemba at Lehman and Utica’s Adrian Romanski.

Hunter had two swimmers in the collegiate ranks: Cary Stathopoulos at Dartmouth and Truman Liang at Northwestern. The former was 20th in the freestyle mile at the Ivy Championships, while the latter was part of the 400 free relay team that placed eighth at the Big Ten Championships.

Harvard’s Maggie Wollner (Riverdale) finished third in the 800 free relay at the East Coast Athletic Conference Championships and also broke the minute barrier in the 100 butterfly. Chessie Crane (Dalton) made her conference’s All-Academic Team while at Hamilton. Chrissy Stark (Cathedral) swam for John Jay, and Doug Ellman (Regis) competed at Princeton. Sydney Miller, meanwhile, took her talent in the pool from Columbia Prep to Bowdoin.

Two Spence graduates had standout seasons. Duke’s Katharine Bodnar was 16th in the 400 IM at the Atlantic Coast Conference Championships, finishing in less than 4:26. And at Georgetown, Katherine Lee placed 30th in the 100 breaststroke at the Big East Championships. Francesca Pirog (Brearley) and Katie Bolander (Nightingale) were also on the Georgetown roster.

Finally, Drew’s Tim Charpie (Lycee Francais) wrapped up his college career with the eighth best times ever at his school in the 400 IM, freestyle mile and 200 fly.

Other Sports—Bill Keenan (Collegiate) played hockey at Harvard. Celeste Abou Negm (Chapin) was a constant presence at No. 2 doubles and No. 4 singles on the Swarthmore badminton team. And Margot Stuchin (Horace Mann) was once again a standout archer for Columbia. She finished second at the U.S. Indoor National Championships with the recurve bow.

Hunter finished the regular season last year with a disastrous 2-13-1 record, but the Hawks improved this fall, thanks to a dynamic group of juniors and sophomores. And though Leahy, who played previously at the Trevor Day School on the Upper West Side, didn’t pick up any postseason honors, his performance was important in the turnaround effort. He played in 18 games and started 10 as a defensive midfielder. His first collegiate goal helped provide a victory against SUNY-Maritime in early September.

Devin Leahy has helped turn around Hunter’s soccer team.

By the end of the regular season, Hunter was 9-7-1, a solid record but not one that turns heads. The Hawks certainly drew notice in the playoffs, though, by beating both City Tech and Brooklyn College in overtime games.

Extra periods couldn’t resolve the title match after Hunter tied York College 1-1, partly thanks to a goal that Leahy set up. That meant penalty kicks would have to determine the outcome, and once again the sophomore rose to the occasion. The Hawks couldn’t convert their first two attempts and quickly fell behind. But they made some clutch shots to tie things up at two goals apiece. Then Leahy, with his team’s fate resting on his foot, stepped up to the mark and sent a low shot to the right side of the net.

Game over: Hunter earned its first city championship and NCAA Tournament berth since 1999.

As usual, the fall has seen dozens of local athletes playing in college arenas. The following is a round-up of Manhattanites who attended high school on either the East or West Side.

Soccer
Besides Leahy, the best soccer season undoubtedly belonged to Dan Hicks, a sophomore goalie at Bowdoin. He started the bulk of the season, finishing with a 1.47 goals-against average, 49 saves and a save percentage of .731 for a 6-8 team. He was joined on the pitch by Daniel Chaffetz, a former high school teammate of his at Trinity. Also a sophomore, Chaffetz started three games as a defenseman for the Polar Bears.

Monroe College, meanwhile, had a trio of local freshmen. Daniel Solis and Alassane Diakite, both members of the championship team at Martin Luther King Jr. a year ago, competed for the Mustangs. Solis played in 13 games as a midfielder and had a goal and an assist. He was joined by Jonathan Ortiz (Norman Thomas), who contributed two goals and an assist as a forward. At City College, America Nazario (Julia Richman) played 13 games and started 10 along the back line.

Three more freshmen saw action on college pitches this fall. Michael Chew (Collegiate) played in nine games for Bard, notching one goal for an 8-7-1 team. Briggin Scharf (Spence), a defender, saw action in eight games and started one at Oberlin. And Andrew Scott (Trinity) played four games for Hamilton.

Cross Country
Najua Ward (Beacon) continued to run impressively for City College during his sophomore season, finishing 12th at the CUNYAC Championships and 15th at the Baruch Invitational. Teammate Jabreel Sabir (Environmental Studies) placed 43rd at the CUNYAC meet.

Collegiate’s always impressive corps of runners also had a good fall. Dylan Trotzuk (Harvard) and Joe Myrie (University of Pennsylvania) wrapped up their freshmen seasons, while sophomore Peter Vizcarrondo competed for Yale. He finished 11th at the Fairfield Invitational.

Also at Harvard, Elizabeth Heller (Brearley) began her college career by finishing 88th at the Eastern College Athletic Conference Championships with a time of 20:18 on a five-kilometer course. UPenn’s Josh Weinstein (Dalton) was 21st at the Old Nassau Run during his sophomore campaign.

Other local runners included Tina Millburn (Chapin) and Kirsten Brown (Hunter) at Tufts and Skyler Walley (Brearley) at Bowdoin.

Tennis
There was a tremendous amount of success on the courts this fall, and freshmen once again led the charge. Princeton’s Hilary Bartlett (Brearley) went 11-4 in doubles and 3-6 in singles. At St. John’s, Milo Hauk (Beacon) finished 10-4 in singles play and 3-4 in doubles. Michael Piderit (Dalton) of Wesleyan compiled an impressive 5-1 mark at No. 5 singles and a record of 4-2 at No. 2 doubles. He had good competition among conference foes from two Columbia Prep graduates: Julian Camacho at Amherst and Josh Cranin at Bowdoin. Camacho went 2-2 in both singles and doubles, while Cranin finished 4-4 on his own and 1-3 with a partner. A third former player at Columbia Prep, Emily Wolf, made her collegiate debut at UPenn. Rebecca Brown (Dalton) did the same at Oberlin, compiling marks of 1-4 and 2-3 in singles and doubles, respectively. And finally, Warren Elgort moved from Trinity to Johns Hopkins and put together an impressive fall. He finished 7-3 in singles and 4-2 in doubles.

Upperclassmen didn’t do badly, either. Curtis Roby (Trinity) continued his impressive career at Dartmouth. He was 5-2 as a singles player and 4-0 in doubles, winning the Dartmouth Shootout “C” Singles Title and the doubles bracket at the Big Green Invite. At defending national champion Williams, Kathryn Friedman (Chapin) was 6-4 in singles and 3-4 in doubles.

Caroline Gottlieb (Brearley) played at Bates, and Gabrielle Hess (Ramaz) started her senior season at Yeshiva by finishing 4-4 in singles and 3-5 in doubles, mostly in the No. 1 slot.

Volleyball
Andrea Rosengarten (Spence) was a serendipitous addition to the volleyball team at Colby this year. The freshman outside hitter played in every match for her 12-16 team and proved quite a force, both offensively and defensively. As an attacker, she finished with 227 kills, 45 aces and 19 assists. When it came to keeping points alive, she was just as spectacular, contributing 359 digs and 15 blocks.

Mary Reiser (Nightingale-Bamford), also a freshman, saw limited action for Amherst this fall, helping her team to a 22-8 record. She appeared in nine matches and recorded nine kills, seven digs and seven blocks. Thea Schlieben (Rudolf Steiner) played 12 matches for Brooklyn College and notched nine kills, four assists and 14 digs. At Kenyon, Meggie Strew (Trevor Day) started her college career by appearing in three games.

Lisa Jasienowski was the most accomplished local volleyball player besides Rosengarten. The sophomore outside hitter from York Prep played in every match for Skidmore, helping her team finish 26-10 by registering 77 kills, 19 digs and 57 blocks.

Other Sports
Brianne and Clementine Goutal (both from the Professional Children’s School) participated on the equestrian team at Brown this fall. At Bowdoin, Becca Warner (Chapin) played golf and Rafaela Uribe (St. Jean Baptiste) joined the rugby team as a prop. And though Manhattan has very few high school football teams, Terence Mooney (Hunter) didn’t let that stop him from reaching the college gridiron. He joined the Kenyon football squad as a backup quarterback.

For June Piniewski, the head coach of the squad from Hunter College High School, it was all a bit too much in the wake of her team’s 2-0 loss to Christopher Columbus High School in the “A” Division.

“We had a successful season, but…” she said before trailing off.

To call Hunter’s season a success is a bit of an understatement. The Headhunters finished 12-0 in the

regular season and ran away with their league title. They surrendered only two games all season, sweeping the rest of their matches. But that was sometimes hard to remember in the aftermath of a first-round upset that left their head coach momentarily speechless and most of the players too upset to talk.

“Hunter is always pretty decent in the playoffs,” said Piniewski, who guided her team to the city semifinals last year. “We usually go pretty far, and this is a tough loss after going undefeated during the regular season. I think we had a little bit of an off day. Our sets were a little off, and our hits were a little off.”

The problems were apparent from the beginning as Columbus took an immediate 4-0 lead. Hunter did not seem to find its rhythm until the middle of the game, and by then it was too late as Columbus won seven straight points to finish 25-14.

The second game was much more promising for the Headhunters. Though they never found their offensive firepower, they managed to bait their opponents into a series of hitting errors. Hunter made up a four-point deficit midway through and then took a brief 20-19 lead. The score was knotted at 23, but Columbus pulled away to win, capping the victory with an ace.

Hunter received valiant efforts from players like setter Francesca Sosnowski, who finished with seven assists. Nicole Zelek had three aces and six digs, while Thea Goldring led the defense with eight digs. Daniela Bartalini, who contributed six service points on Saturday, finished fourth in the city during the season for that statistic with 110.

Though the match was ostensibly an upset—the 24th-ranked team over the no. 9 seed—Columbus was likely placed too low thanks to a schedule that featured tough league foes. As if to prove the point, it beat the eighth-seeded team the next day.
“They were everywhere all the time,” Piniewski said. “They worked hard and dove for every ball. We couldn’t prepare ourselves for their kind of attack when we hadn’t seen it earlier this year. That left us out of position sometimes.”

But the young (if the cliché may be permitted) are resilient, and this is especially true when they can be proud of an astonishingly successful season. And so by the time the players emerged from the locker room at Brearley’s field house on the Upper East Side about 20 minutes after falling in the semifinals of the New York State Association of Independent Schools (NYSAIS) volleyball championship, heads were once again held high.

Danielle Dong, a junior at Brearley, jumps to send the ball over the net. Photo By: Andrew Schwartz

“They played together and supported one another,” Brearley head coach Susan Seufert said. “If one part of the unit wasn’t working, the others would pick up the slack. The kids on the bench stepped in all the time. This was one of the most successful seasons I’ve ever been a part of.”

Brearley finished with a sparkling record of 18-3, and according to Nafeesa Islam and Addy Shreffler, two of the squad’s captains, that success came almost entirely from teamwork.

“I think it’s the team. We’re kind of a cult,” Islam said with a laugh. “It’s all about the team for us. I’ve been playing volleyball for nine years, and I’ve never been on a team as close as this one. And I think that cohesiveness has really helped us on the court. It’s all about how excited we are. We always cheer each other. We’re always pulling for one another.”
“Volleyball is all about trust, so if you trust your team you play well,” Shreffler added.

Trust and teamwork kept the squad close throughout the match against Horace Mann. Islam often played the role of an emotional sparkplug, initiating cheers among her teammates and at one point egging on the home crowd to get louder. But on a day when Horace Mann’s defense was indefatigable, Brearley played mostly from behind.

“They were a scrappy team. They just kept coming at us,” Seufert said.
Horace Mann won the first game 25-23 and had victory nearly in hand in the second game, going ahead by four points early and eventually holding a 22-18 lead. But then, in the most brilliant moment of the night for the hosts, Brearley stormed back.

Islam and Shreffler provided the defense, setting up fellow captain and setter Liz Moore to run the offense. She directed the ball to the two best hitters, Emily Auran and freshman Catherine Egan, for some powerful spikes. Together they scored seven straight to win the game. Junior Danielle Dong capped the run with a service ace, one of two she had on the night to go along with 16 digs, or defensive saves.

“It was their heart,” Seufert said. “They were already talented when they came out to preseason. But from that point they gave everything they had, and I knew we had something special from the get go.”

Islam finished with 21 digs, Shreffler had 16 and Moore 15 as well as 21 assists and three blocks. Auran racked up 14 kills (successful attacks), while Egan had 10, along with three blocks. The skill on both sides of the net was such that long rallies became common, neither team willing to let a mistake interrupt the action.

But, in the end, Brearley couldn’t make up a deficit two games in a row. Once again, the hosts fell behind early in the third game, and this time they could not catch up. Despite tying up the score several times, they lost 25-19.

“Up until the 24th point in the third game, I still had complete confidence that we could win,” Seufert said. “And that’s something special about this group, to have that type of confidence.”

Two days later, Horace Mann lost the NYSAIS championship match to Spence 3-2. Spence also won the postseason tournament of the Athletic Association of Independent Schools, a citywide league, by upsetting Brearley in the final two weeks ago.

Despite those twin letdowns, Seufert had plenty to be proud of in her first year as head coach. Her team won the AAIS season title because of its regular-season record and came close to winning the state trophy for the first time since 2005. Gabi D’Addario, a member of that championship team and now a student at Columbia, served as assistant coach for Brearley this season. She and Seufert were there to remind their players after the match how much they had accomplished

“The special moments of this season were in the day to day,” Seufert said. “It really was. I know that sounds a little clichéd, but we came to every practice excited. We had challenges, but this team kept getting better and rising to every occasion. I can’t single out anyone. We had great senior leadership, but everyone played well.”