Commencement Edition of BearSportsNews

As noted by Messrs. Armstrong and Joyce, while a Commencement comes at the end of an academic year, it actually means a beginning. This edition will sum up some of the end of year Bear news, but also point to the future.

All IAC, All Met and All American

All IAC

BaseballAlex Norwinski ’15

GolfBrent Bubes ’14Morgan Egloff ’15Evan Katz ’17Jeff Samit ’17

LacrosseSam Lynch ’14Jack Bolen ’14Sean K. O’Brien ’14Colton Rupp ’15

TennisGabriel Goldberg ’15Alexander Reinke ’14

Track & FieldOliver Hightower ’14Romare Marshall ’14Tumi Onaghise ’14

All Met and All American lacrosse

Sean K. O’Brien ’14

All American – Academic lacrosse

Jack Bolen ’14

Bear Sailing

From Landon.net

The Landon sailing team earned four honors at this year’s DC Sail High School Sailing Team Awards. Max Beyer ’17 won the Most Valuable Sailor Award for the Green Fleet division, which is comprised of first-year racers. Also in the Green Fleet class, Jack Pingle ’16 received the Most Improved Award and Andrew Javens ’17 scored the Coaches Award. Team Captain Aaron Beguelin ’14 rounded out the honors with a junior varsity Coaches Award.

These accolades capped off a season that saw Bear JV sailors (who compete two men to a boat) beat out 13 other teams (28 boats total) to win the first regatta of the season and place second out of 37 boats in the next regatta. Meanwhile, the boat skippered by Pingle in the final Green Fleet regatta of the season took top prize.

That is an impressive showing for a team that didn’t exist until two years ago, when then-sophomore Beguelin — who grew up sailing the waters off Connecticut and Rhode Island — decided he wanted to bring sailing to Landon. So Beguelin approached DC Sail, an umbrella program that provides coaching and regatta competitions for high-school sailing teams made up of 75 kids from school across the metro area, about starting a Landon team. While the DC Sail coaches were enthusiastically on board with the idea, the one thing Beguelin lacked was teammates — so that first year he sailed alone.

“The next year I wanted to make sure I had a team that was ready to go, but I didn’t want to get up at school and make an announcement,” Beguelin said. “So I did it grass-roots, and just approached people I thought would be a good fit.”

By the time the following season rolled around, Luke Glen ’16 and Beguelin’s hockey teammate Ben Gilbert ’16 had joined the team. Glen sailed junior varsity, while Gilbert, a newbie to the sport, caught on quickly and sailed varsity with Beguelin. This past season, five more Landon students signed up: Walker Hague ’15, Jack Pingle and his younger brother Hayden Pingle ’17, Andrew Javens and Max Beyer. Hague and Gilbert will captain the team next year.

Despite the growing numbers, Beguelin was the only Landon sailor to qualify for the DC Sail varsity squad this season (tryouts are held each year). So, rather than go it alone, the senior decided to stick with his teammates and sail JV instead.

“This is my last year at Landon, so I’m focused on legacy and what I want to leave behind, and my top priority was to make sure this team will be able to continue for years to come,” Beguelin explained. “I figured the best way to do that was to be a hands-on leader and to sail JV so I could be with my other Landon guys and show them what they needed to do if the coaches were busy with other teams. I felt that was important as far as showing the leadership that should be there in the type of program I wanted to create and hope continues at the school.”

Beguelin’s selflessness did not go unnoticed. The soon-to-be-graduate, who will attend Hamilton University in the fall, made a lasting impression on the DC Sail coaches.

“The coaches felt strongly that [Aaron’s] dedication to his team even at the expense of his own personal ambitions warranted the highest esteem,” DC Sail Assistant Coach Prag Katta said of the decision to honor Beguelin with the Coaches Award. “This selflessness, this subsuming of his own ego led directly to the quick development of the Landon team. … He aided the coaches in understanding quickly the developmental status of each member of his team and he laid the groundwork for the future development of his team.”

Varsity Athletes who excelled in other school endeavors

This involved multiple cross-referencing award lists and Landon’s 19 sports; so it is VERY likely that I missed one or more Bears who should be on this list. Search of the Landon website did not result in finding the names of boys who were involved in class and upper school leadership.

The point of this lengthy table is to celebrate the degree to which all Bears explore academic excellence, community service, performing arts, studio arts, ethics and other areas BEFORE they walk on fields, courts, rinks, pools, tracks, bodies of water. Twenty boys received some recognition for the work in endeavors other than sports. Given the time commitment of all of these spheres, these are remarkable performances. This table is not intended to diminish the hard work of the Bears who are not on this list; just to show in one place the unusual breadth of accomplishment of these multiple pursuit boys.

student		Teams	Awards
Ozair Ahmad		golf	Baccalaureate speaker, Cum Laude
Raman Ananthanpillai		Winter track, tennis	National School Orchestra Award for Strings, Cum Laude
Steve Bauer		Lacrosse	Mary Lou Ourisman Award for Drama,
Jack Bolen		Cross country, lacrosse	Cum Laude
Ryan Curto		Swim and Dive,	Fathers Club Citizenship Award, Cum Laude, Bearitones Award for A Capella Music, Booth Tech Award
Jules Desroches		Football, wrestling, rugby	The Carroll Mercer Marbury Award
Thomas Dunnigan		Basketball	Cum laude
Ethan Fieger		lacrosse	Valedictorian, The Cary Maguire ’46 Ethics Scholar
Leo Falcone		Cross country, lacrosse	Advanced Handbell Ringer Award
Jack Gilbert		Cross country, swim & dive, Spring Track	Robert Long Award for Perseverance:
Robbie Hefferon		Water polo, swim & dive	The Upper School Headmaster’s Award, Mary Lou Ourisman Award for Drama, Cum Laude
Garland Kennedy		Water polo, swim & dive	David Foster Award for Excellence in Writing, History Award for Outstanding Achievement, Excellence in Latin Award, Cum Laude
Brandon Johnson		Football, lacrosse	John Edward Marshall Prize for Improvement in Writing
Marcus Kindfuller		Water polo, swim & dive	John Edward Marshall Prize for Improvement in Writing
Harry Laird		Soccer, basketball	The Malcolm Coates Student Activities Award, The Patrick Tanner ’96 Community Service Award, Cum Laude
Kevin Soraci		Cross Country, Winter Track, Spring Track,	The Eleanor Ann Johnson Award, Overall Excellence in Science Award, Cum Laude
Walter Spak		Soccer golf	Landon Mothers Association Studio Arts Award
Culver VanVleck		Hockey, tennis	Louis Armstrong Award for Jazz Band
Aaron Zaimi		soccer	Excellence in French Award:

NCAA Baseball

Max Kra’12 pitched two scoreless innings in relief for Bucknell against the #1 seed UVa; the Cavaliers prevailed, however.

Also a great picture of Ian Kelso ‘11playing baseball for the Bears of Washington University

Princeton Lacrosse

Jack Strabo’10 received the Scott P. Klurfeld ’74 award, chosen by his teammates as one who embodies the qualities of perseverance, hard work, team spirit and dedication to Lacrosse and to Princeton. Brian Reilly’09 was awarded the John T. Schroeder Class of 1992 Men’s Lacrosse Award for his embodiment of character and selfless devotion to the team and having had the greatest impact on the success of Princeton Men’s Lacrosse. Brian received a very high honor from his classmates by being elected as a Member of the Princeton University Board.

COMMENCEMENT →FORWARD

These are a few, quick personal observations about the 2014 and 2015 Bear team. Unfortunately, my knowledge of some sports is so minimal that to share my thoughts would be at best supercilious; here are a couple of thoughts about the future:

Football—all of the Bear offensive linemen return and the starting running backs are back; the defense should be anchored by an impressive pair of DE’s; losses in the perimeter speed means Coach Padalino will have to find replacements. Bullis has already received a LOT of press about college scouts drooling over several of their studs. Prep will be Prep; EHS and SSSA had rosters with much potential.

Basketball—if one is to believe DCSportsFan (a BIG supposition, but hopefully true), “2017 combo guard Chyree Walker” is leaving PVI to go back to Landon. New Coach Coates is attracting some familiar talent.

Hockey—New (sort of) Coach Farnstrom lost the team’s top player. Its starting goalie and a set of contributing seniors, but last year’s club won on teamwork. The ’14-’15 squad will be bolstered by the Middle School and some returning talent. The MAPHL league play is changing in its format and what that limits/allows in terms of scheduling will be news. The most intriguing part of every IAC hockey season is reading the other school rosters.

Golf – Four seniors are no longer available for Coach Duquette, but he has a LOT of young talent returning witness the above-mentioned All IAC junior and two freshman.

Lacrosse—nine 2014 members are off to play college lacrosse, but Coach Bordley has lots of talent coming back. Rumors abound about multiple coaching changes in the DMV, including (true) former Bear Coach Horsey will take over at St. John’s College HS.