Spring sports previews (continued)

To read spring sports previews for badminton, baseball, boys golf, boys tennis and boys volleyball, click here.

Boys Lacrosse

The boys lacrosse team is preparing for the start of their new season after finishing up last year’s season with a 11-5 overall record. Their strength for this season is in their numbers.

“This year[‘s strengths] are similar to what we had last year,” said head coach Evan King. “We’re keeping it consolidated as one program and got really good numbers. So [we don’t have to] worry about keeping a full roster late in the season. Sport inevitably will have injuries … and not worrying about it … is always nice.”

Although practices are imperative, at this time, they are limited.

“Field time is a challenge from time to time because there are tons of sports right now,” said senior attacker Max Lacasse. “Just getting on the field sometimes is tough.” 

The boys lacrosse team is set on completing competitive goals throughout the season.

“I think our main goal is … to beat Hillsdale for sure,” Lacasse said. “They got us this year in basketball and football, so we have to get them back. Another tough one is making the playoffs. There’s only eight teams that can make it so it [will be] super competitive.”

The team’s opening game is at home against Gunn on March 21 at 7 p.m.

Reporting by Sora Mizutani

Girls Lacrosse

ugh last season with an overall record of 3-10, the team looks forward to building their strengths.

“[I think our strength is that] we have a lot of leadership,” said senior defender Alana Bonilla. “We have our seniors who have done lacrosse, including [during] the summers. We are able to help out our coach. We [especially] help out with teaching the younger players how to play and mak[ing] them feel comfortable.”

Since the team is made up of mostly underclassmen, the first few practices are focused more on teaching the sport of lacrosse.

“We’ve been doing more teaching than strategies [to build] basic skills,” said head coach Ashley Parham. “[Soon,] … we’ll start scrimmaging more. I think we’ll separate varsity versus junior varsity because [right now] we are all practicing together to help facilitate the learning.”

The team hopes that practicing together will bring improvement from last year.

“I think … we need to work more as a team,” Bonilla said. “Last year, we were kind of separated. But working more as a team will get us to maybe succeed more.”

The team’s next home game is on March 10 against Hillsdale (1-2 overall)* at 5:30 p.m.

*Records as of March 6.

Reporting by Sora Mizutani

Softball

Coming off of a season where the softball team ended first in the Peninsula Bay League with a league record of 13-1, the team (1-2 overall)* prepares for the new season ahead. After the loss of several key players, head coach Liz Roscoe stresses the importance of teamwork for the young team this year as she works on developing the program.

“When I started the season, the goals were to be better teammates to each other, which we have … accomplished in a 360,” Roscoe said. “I’m very proud of them.” 

With that new sense of teamwork comes responsibility and leadership from the upperclassman on the team. In the weeks leading up to their first games, Roscoe has seen tremendous support from the upperclassman in practice, as they help many freshmen settle in.

“Working on our outfield stuff, I take the upperclassmen who are really good and have them work with the underclassmen and they’ve been wonderful about doing that,” Roscoe said. “It’s making us a better team because we’re working together.”

The team’s next non-league home game is against Design Tech (1-0 overall)* on March 9 at 4 p.m.

*Records as of March 6. 

Reporting by Quinn Shirley

Swimming

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This year’s practices are not going the way head coach Bill Barthold had hoped for.

“[It has been] a little bit of hit and miss [because] not everybody is showing up,” Barthold said. “We have a large number of people who signed up … but it always goes down over the season. People decide it’s not for them, or they can’t [manage] schedules or injuries.”

Practices are five days a week, starting 30 minutes after the last bell and lasting for about an hour and a half. The athletes also have additional two morning workouts on Thursdays and Fridays.

“Teams are split up not by varsity and junior varsity, but by ability and potential, so the higher potential swimmers [are] not necessarily the fastest,” Barthold said. 

As the season progresses, Barthold has hopes for the swimmers.

“My goal is to make every swimmer better than they are,” Barthold said. “That could be going faster, learning a new stroke [and getting] greater confidence. Other than that, I would say [that] I would love to see more team unity and camaraderie and spirit.”

Looking forward, both teams will have their second league meet on March 9 against Menlo-Atherton at 3:30 p.m.

Reporting by Sora Mizutani

Track and Field

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This season, Aragon’s track and field team has about 120 members and welcomed 34 freshmen consisting of 16 girls and 18 boys.

“We’re really pleased with the amount of freshmen … that have [joined],” said head coach Greg Alvarado. “That’s a big improvement [from] past [years].”

To get ready for the upcoming meets, the team has been hard at work.

“We practice every day and some of the kids practice on Saturdays,” Alvarado said. “We work on conditioning and specific events like relay exchanges and hurdles. The field events … spend a lot of time on technique.”

Alvarado feels confident about the upcoming season. Last season, both varsity boys and varsity girls teams won their Bay Divisions with overall records of 4-1 and 5-0 respectively. Junior long jumper Pia Cho and senior pole vaulter Erik Dodge also qualified for the 2022 state meet. 

“We’ve had a lot of success the last four or five years,” Alvarado said. “The goal is to continue to be at the top of the heap.” 

The team’s first meet on a relay invitational will be at Hillsdale on March 11. 

Reporting by Neeha Kumar