Trojans face tough stretch ahead

Park Hill football fans were treated to quite a show last Friday as the Trojans defeated North Kansas City 48-6 during Homecoming week. It was likely the last game the Trojans (4-2) will come in as such a high favorite, before they enter a stretch of games that feature the likes of top ranked teams Lee’s Summit West and Staley over the next two weeks. Park Hill will travel to the more immediate threat, Lee’s Summit West (5-1), this Friday to face a team coming off a 42-0 thumping of Truman last week. Lee’s Summit West appears to be the toughest game standing between the Trojans and a conference championship. Both teams are currently 3-0 in league play.

“Even though we don’t put as much pressure on ourselves for conference, if we win this game we’ve at least set ourselves up for a tie,” Coach Greg Reynolds said. “We need to show ourselves we can go out and play with some of the best.”

Park Hill running back Trace Norfleet produced one of his top career performances with 195 yards rushing on 18 carries resulting in four touchdowns, one of which was receiving, last Friday against North Kansas City. Norfleet started the Trojans off with touchdowns in Park Hill’s first two possessions to put them up 14-0. The first a 21 yard scamper to the end zone with the second coming on a smoothly carried out 10 yard screen pass from Nate Wilson. Fullback Jordan Wang tagged on a two yard touchdown run before Norfleet’s 40 yard dash to the end zone put Park Hill up 28-0 at the half.
Naturally inclined to run to the outside, Norfleet has worked on seeing holes available to the inside of the field over recent weeks, which has allowed him to become more of an overall threat.

“The coaches thought I started to dance too much, and not getting up field,” Norfleet said. “I like to get on the outside, but today it showed that the hole can be anywhere and it paid off tonight.”

“We’ve told him we think there are some holes inside if he just makes a cut to get downhill,” Reynolds said.
While you won’t see Norfleet as outspoken as some of his senior teammates, he’s embraced the role of leading a younger team by example as a two-year starter.

“I think leading by example is just as important as being a big talker,” Norfleet said. “I’ve learned the heart and passion of the game. We’ve got a young team and I want to live up to their expectations.”

Norfleet would tag on another touchdown of 16 yards before being taken out of the game with a 35-0 lead. An interception by Gage Wright in the third quarter set Luke Bossert up for a 22-yard touchdown reception. The Hornets did manage to score in the fourth quarter before Park Hill’s Troy Bennett dealt the last blow with his late touchdown to make the final score 49-6.

PH Swim looks for conference repeat

There comes a point in every season, no matter what the results have been, where athletes get tired. They’ve been going through the same practice routine for months not including the months of preparation leading up to the season, but the end isn’t quite in sight. It has nothing to do with a lack of passion, drive, or physical ability. It has to do with mental fatigue and the urge to reach the point in the season where the rewards of their labor can pay off.

The Park Hill boys swim and dive team is at that point now, but they only need to look to last year’s conference swim meet to remember how it can all pay off. For over a decade Park Hill had trailed Park Hill South, who had won conference titles year after year. This changed last year when Park Hill beat their rival by a single point to win their own conference championship.

“Last year at the conference meet we found out how important each person on the team is,” head coach Karl Haley said. “If one person didn’t do what they did, then it wouldn’t have happened.”

Redistricting has separated the two schools into different conferences, but the measuring stick is still in place for the Trojans even though they were able to break through last season.

“The perpetual monkey is off our back, but we’ll still see them throughout the season,” Haley said. “They’re a good team and we know if we can compete with them, we’ll be a good team too.”

This year, Park Hill has Lee’s Summit West as an obstacle to a second straight conference title. The Trojans beat the Titans in their opening meet this season by just ten points. In building up to that point, one of their more competitive meets of the year takes place next weekend in the Kansas City Classic which brings together Columbia, Springfield, and Kansas City’s top teams.

“The biggest thing for us right now is everyone is real tired, but they just have to keep swimming fast,” Haley said. “It’s a mental sport, we do all this hardcore training to build up to the last two weeks of the year and a lot of kids want to see the pay off immediately.”

The Trojans return a number of lettermen and state qualifiers from last year. Diver Toby Parker has already qualified for the state meet after significantly improving from last year.

“You could really see he wanted to do better, so he put the effort in the off season, joined a club team,” Haley said. “He has a chance (to win), but will definitely score some points.”

Ben Svoboda, Chris Greger, Matt Johnson, Matt Wagner, Sam Blacksher, and Vince Tutorino have already qualified for events in the state meet in November.

The theme is much the same for other athletes looking to clinch a spot as a state qualifier, but the overall meter of success midway through the season is where they were last year at this time.

“As a coach you always expect more, but we’re past where we were a year ago so that’s what we’re looking for,” Haley said.

Fall Roundup: September 26 - October 2

Park Hill Softball
Park Hill softball has seen a busy stretch of games over the final two weeks of the season as they've gone 3-3 to improve to 10-13 on the year before heading into district play. During that time, Park Hill lost a close 1-0 game against conference member Lee's Summit West. They then traveled to Columbia for the Hickman Kewpie Classic where they defeated the host school 5-3 with some clutch hitting from Bethany Sullinger, Samantha Snodgrass, and Paige Downs along with Mackenzie Porter retired nine of the last ten batters. Falling in the next game 11-2 to Blue Springs South, the Trojans came back to beat Blair Oaks in extra innings 3-2 before falling in their final Classic game to St. Dominick's 12-4. Late last week, Park Hill thumped North Kansas City 20-4 as the bats came alive and Porter added her ninth win of the season. Park Hill starts district play this week as the four seeded playing Staley, a rematch of last year's district championship game. If the Trojans win they'll go on to play top seeded Kearney in the semi final round.

Park Hill Soccer
Park Hill defeated Lee's Summit West with penalty kicks last week 1-1. Matt Russell scored the only goal in regulation. After no scoring took place in overtime, the Trojans won 4-3 in the penalty kick round. Traveling to St. Joe Central, the Trojans came home with a 3-1 win with two goals from Cole Walker and another from David Zdvorak. They'll participate in the Park Hill South Panther Classic all this week before facing Ruskin and Rockhurst next week. The game against Rockhurst will be a rematch of the upset Park Hill pulled when they beat soccer powerhouse Rockhurst on their home field. Park Hill is now 11-2-1 on the season.
Park Hill Volleyball
Park Hill Volleyball pulled out two conference wins last week as they went 2-1. After starting off the week with a tough loss at Blue Springs (25-14, 25-10), the Trojans handedly beat Rusking 25-16, 25-16 and St. Joe Central 25-21, 25-13 to improve to 12-10-1. Jenny Riddle and Ashlea Williams had 7 kills a piece against Ruskin while Alyssa Moran's 10 kills and Halley Knudson's 8 digs led Park Hill past St. Joe Central. This week they'll play Lee's Summit West and Truman.

Park Hill Girls Golf
The Park Hill Girl’s Golf Team placed third out of 11 teams in the district tournament with a team score of 396. Four of their five golfers advanced to the sectional competition to be held this week. Anna Kloeppel placed third overall with an 86. Kloeppel was All-District First Team. The other sectional qualifiers were Stephanie Atkinson, Samantha Brunker, and Bailey Warlen.

Park Hill Girls Cross Country
The Trojan cross country team continues to make strides as they placed ninth out of 26 teams at the KC Metro Classic at Ray-Pec last weekend. Kim Rau placed eleventh individually with a time of 19:29 in the 5k race. Brook Bischof (36th), Maggie Lanham (56th), Joanna Grauberger (67th) and Maddie Bischoff (97th) finished off the Park Hill team. Over 180 runners participated in the race.

Top tennis player puts on game face

Some true competitors are hard to spot when they’re not in action. Even on the surface when initially meeting them, you may be surprised they’re able to aggressively excel as much as they do when they present such a welcoming and innocent demeanor. The high school sports world is full of these types of competitors and you can see the change take place as they step from non-playing surface to playing surface.

Park Hill junior Suzanne Barth is one of those athletes and it’s even more evident this season as she is working to not only return to the state tennis tournament’s championship match again, but to win that match after coming in second a year ago. Kirkwood’s Rachel Stuhlmann, who Barth lost to in consecutive sets (6-0, 6-0) last year, has graduated leaving Barth with the added motivation to claim what she had come so close to doing last year as a sophomore. Coach Rustin Reys doesn’t believe it’s a matter of ability, but mentality.

“She’s so talented that she just has to learn to use her weapons to the best of her ability,” Reys said. “If her game plan and approach is right, she can’t be beat.”

Asked what it was like to be selected as one of the team captains as a junior, Barth will respond humbly, but her coach says she is a natural selection based on her own work ethic. While she may be soft spoken in the hallways of Park Hill, Barth seems to become someone different when she steps onto the court for practice or a match.

“She’s very authoritative when it comes to leading the team and pushing herself hard,” Reys said. “She’s very competitive and wants to win 10-0 every match.”

“I don’t like losing,” Barth said of her approach to competing. “It’s important to stay mentally strong all day.

Park Hill lost its first conference meet in several years to Lee’s Summit West last week. Although Barth did not play, as a captain she knew how important it was to shake the loss off and set their sights on the post-season.

“We need to stay positive,” Barth said. “We lost the match earlier in the week, so we just need to stay together.”

Although bummed with a sore left wrist of late, Barth’s one more year of experience and practice could bring her back to the state tournament as a more mature player and her coaches believe it will be the way she handles adversity that could be the difference maker.

“She has all the skills to be a state champ because she has no shot that needs improvement,” Reys said. “If she can make good game decisions, she will do well.”

Park Hill looks to Homecoming

After a disappointing road trip and defeat at Jefferson City last week 40-14, the Trojans will return to their home field this week as they host North Kansas City and hold homecoming festivities at Shorty Preston Field. North Kansas City comes into Friday’s game with a 1-4 record after winning their first game of the season last week against Ruskin by a slim 22-20 margin. In addition to a conference game, this will be a final tune-up for both teams as next week will be the first round of district play.

While Jefferson City has more than a one hundred year football history, Park Hill coach Greg Reynolds hoped his Trojan team would be able to match their own recent decade of successes with the Blue Jays last week. Park Hill struck first when Trace Norfleet put the Trojans on the board with his four yard touchdown run. Jefferson City bounced back by scoring two touchdowns. The first was a 25 yard run by Same Turner while the other was a 42 yard touchdown pass to Jeremy Tisdel. Park Hill tied it up at 14-14 before the half when Nathan Wilson found De’Aris Flint for a nine yard touchdown pass.

Tied at the half on the road against a good team was a good place to be in for the Trojans, but Jefferson City came alive in the third quarter by scoring 19 unanswered points followed by another touchdown in the fourth quarter. Jefferson City’s Devon Moore produced several long runs against the Trojans included the first two touchdowns in the half. He ended the night with seven carries for 106 yards. While Park Hill’s Trace Norfleet had 138 yards rushing, he needed 26 carries to get it, which is well above his season average.

Park Hill is now 3-2 on the season with a 2-0 conference record coming into this week.

Fall Roundup: September 20-24

Park Hill Boys Soccer
Park Hill Soccer went 3-0 last week with wins against St. Joe Central, Ruskin, and Blue Springs. An 11-2 thumping of St. Joe started off the week followed by another convincing 9-1 victory against Ruskin with three goals from Cole Walker, two a piece from Ray Lee and Neal Sampson, and one from Nick Shepherd. They finished off the week with an exciting 2-1 victory over Blue Springs in overtime with goals from David Zdvorak and Quenton Noble. The Trojans are now 9-2-1 going into this week's competitions against Lee's Summit West and St. Joe Central.

Park Hill Girls Tennis
Park Hill Girls Tennis has had quite a streak of conference success of recent years, but it came to an end last week as they lost their first conference match in several years to a talented Lee's Summit West team 7-2 with both the top singles and doubles matches going to the Titans. The Trojans shook it off later in the week with a 9-0 shutout of Ruskin with Ashleigh Bos taking the top singles match 8-1.

Park Hill Volleyball
Park Hill only played one game last week, but it was for a special cause, as the Trojans took on the Liberty North Eagles in their inaugural Dig for a Cure game. Although having defeated them two times already this season, Park Hill got down early inthe first game, but battled to a 24-24 tie before Liberty finally broke it to take a 26-24 victory. The Trojans took the second game 25-18 before the Eagles defeated them 25-21 for the 2-1 victory. Park Hill is now 10-9-1 on the season.

Coach Lindsey Hood was disappointed with the loss, but pointed out the significance of the game off the court with the $4,400 the two teams were able to raise for Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure and Camp Quality, both receiving $2,200.

"We continue to work the big picture of life and remind them that volleyball is not everything," Hood said of the event. "We were very proud of our girls and even though we lost the match, our focus was how accomplished the girls should feel.

Park Hill Girls and Boys Cross Country

They had it marked on their calendars since early August and this past weekend the Park Hill girls cross country team let area teams know they mean business at the Rim Rock Invitational in Lawrence. Their 84 points gave them a first place finish ahead of 23 other teams. The Trojans' top runner, Kim Rau, came in fourth place with a time of 16:03.9.

The Park Hill Boys came in fourth in their division at Rim Rock with a team score of 187.

They will compete in one more event this weekend, the KC Metro Classic, before the Conference race next weekend.

Experienced Trojan golfers look to postseason

Girls high school golf season can be gone in the blink of an eye. Five weeks is all that separates the first week of match play and the conference tournament. For Park Hill golf coach Tari Garner, it’s been a season that has gone by almost too quickly as she’s coaching one of the most talented teams she’s seen in recent years. The Trojans feature two state qualifiers from a year ago, Anna Kloeppel and Stephanie Atkinson, along with Bailey Warlan, Sam Brunker, and Erica Crainshaw. All are returning varsity players from last year.

“We’ve got a great group of girls with great attitude,” Garner said. “It’s gone so fast.”

After catching up with the team last week during a match with Staley, Garner talked about how she is seeing signs of the team peaking at the right time.

“We’re seeing a tremendous drop (in scores) right now which is telling us we’re doing something right,” Garner said. “On average, we’re in the 80’s and we started in the 90’s.”

While the Trojan golfers have seen their scores drop, Garner hoped a lot of the kinks some were experiencing would be worked out with some practice days the team has coming up.

“I don’t know if it’s pressure or if they have to work more on the range,” Garner said. “I think what we need to do is back off and let them figure it out on their own. We’ll have time this week before conference.”

“I think we know our practice levels need to come up and focus needs to get a lot better,” Kloeppel said.

“I’m trying to not worry as much this year because last year we put a lot of pressure on ourselves,” Crainshaw said.

Of course, the short season has been a long time in the making with this group making it a habit of playing and working throughout the summer to come into the season as prepared as possible.

“We worked like crazy this summer and would always have at least one day a week in the summer where we could all work together in addition to our individual time,” Crainshaw said.

“I definitely practiced more this year than in the past,” Kloeppel added.

Although an individual sport, these Park Hill golfers have found improving individually helped their teammates as well, whether it is in practice or getting through a bad round.

“We know what our strengths and weaknesses are, so when we have time we spend it working on those things,” Crainshaw said. “We all build off each other.”

“We all try to help each other so if one of us struggles one day we try to get them through it,” Kloeppel said. “I think when you see one person getting better it motivates you to get better too.”

The conference tournament is this Monday with the district tournament the following week.

Trojans topple Truman, travel to Jeff City

After a 61-20 trampling of Truman last Friday, this week the 3-1 Park Hill will make a long road trip to Jefferson City. The Blue Jays’ program is high on success and tradition, but they’re coming off a narrow 39-36 defeat last week against Columbia Rockbridge and are now 2-2 on the year.

“We’re going to be in a hostile environment with a good team and proud tradition. We have to be ready to play and if we do what we’re supposed to it will be a very good football game,” coach Greg Reynolds said. “I hope these kids represent what this program is, which is one I think is pretty good too.”

With the return of offensive tackle Adam Vanderpool to the lineup, the Trojans were able to turn out one of their most balanced and point producing performances of the season last week with 539 yards of total offense. Making his season debut, Vanderpool provides experience as a returning starter to an offensive line that has experienced some key injuries early in the season. This continued last week as junior Zach Anderson made his first start at guard due to an injury.

“It feels great, I was missing it a lot,” Vanderpool said. “I just have to play hard every play and let those young guys know you can’t take plays off.”

Park Hill jumped out to a 20-0 lead before Truman began to exploit a perceived weakness in the Trojan passing defense with a series of passes which led to a 5-yard touchdown pass to make it 20-7. Although up 34-7 at the half after several touchdown runs from Trace Norfleet, the Patriots kept attacking the flats of the Trojan defense which opened it up for a 41-yard touchdown pass and another deep pass which led to a touchdown.

“The flats, that’s where most of their passes were going. When we got to the flats, they went deep, so they mixed it up well,” linebacker De’Aris Flint said.

The final Truman score halfway through the third quarter to make it 41-20 was their last as Park Hill scored on the first play of the next drive when Nathan Wilson hit Flint for an 83-yard touchdown pass.

Park Hill’s 369 rushing yards was their best running performance of the season which is starting to resemble their ideal offensive play allocation which has heavily relied on the passing game prior to last week.

“It helps a lot especially when we play teams with two safeties. They play for the pass, so when we get the running game going, we just go over the top,” said Flint who had three catches for 105 yards and a touchdown.

Truman’s 252 pass yards was not a point of pride for the Trojan defense, but only giving up 19 rushing yards showed their run defense had stepped up over recent games. Although tackling can never be good enough, it’s been drilled into the players’ mindset as a key to their success.

“Tackling, tackling well. Our run blocking is getting better, but tackling needs to get a lot better,” Flint said.

Fall Roundup: September 13-17

Park Hill Softball
Trojan Softball started the week off with a victory against North Kansas City by a score of 9-0, but fell to conference power Truman 4-0 before participating in the Platte County Tournament over the weekend.

Park Hill Girls Golf
Stephanie Atkinson's 85 and Anna Kloeppel's 86 led the Trojans to an eighth place finish at the Truman/Chrisman Invitational last week. Those scores were good enough for top 20 individual honors with 23 teams and over 100 golfers participating. As a team, Park Hill shot a 402. In a match against Staley last Thursday, Kloeppel and Atkinson led the team again with scores of 44 and 47 respectively on holes.

Park Hill Boys Soccer
Park Hill Boys Soccer improved to 6-2-1 last week with two weeks against Truman (4-0) and North Kansas City (4-0). Two goals from David Ddvorak along with goals from Neal Sampson and Cole Walker led the Trojans to victory against Truman. A hat trick of three goals from Matt Russell and another from Zdvorak helped Park Hill past NKC. Goalie Shane Van Hooser was credited with shutouts in both games. They'll play at Blue Springs this week in their only scheduled game.

Park Hill Volleyball
Park Hill Volleyball fell in two games to rival Park Hill South 25-19 and 25-13 early in last week, but came back to win two matches against Truman and North Kansas City to extend their record to 7-6. Over the weekend they played in the Lee's Summit North tournament where they 3-2-1 and lost in the finals of the consolation bracket. The Trojans are now 10-8-1.

Park Hill Girls Tennis
Park Hill Girls Tennis defeated Oak Park early last week 8-1 with top singles player Suzanne Barth winning 10-0 along with Kate Skorija and Sammy Young's victories. Barth teamed up with Brooke Barnard in the top doubles match to defeat their opposition 10-4. Against St. Joe Central, Barth, Skorija, Barnard, Anna Karsiewicz, Ashlei Bos, and Kelsey Midtbo sweep all six singles matches. After winning two doubles matches the final score was 8-1. They traveled back to St. Joe last Friday for Central's Invitational Tournament where they won two of the four flights and the team title. Barth and Bos won their singles flights while Skorija and Barnard finished third in their doubles flight. Park Hill is 6-1 in match play this season.

Trojan Volleyball gaining traction

First year Park Hill volleyball coach Lindsey Hood’s first week didn’t result the way her team would have liked with losses against Liberty and Oak Park. After their first win of the season last Tuesday against St. Joseph Central and winning the consolation bracket in the Winnetonka Tournament this past weekend, the Trojans have stormed back to a 5-5 record and are now looking to build on their momentum as they approach the heart of their schedule in coming weeks.

After a loss last week to Lee’s Summit West, Hood talked about how she is satisfied with the team’s progress up to this point.

“That’s a great team (Lee’s Summit West). I’m not happy with the result, but I’m happy with how we’re coming along,” Hood said. “We just keep working really hard in practice and I think tonight we proved it even though we didn’t take any games.”

The Trojans have a relatively young team overall with six freshmen playing on the junior varsity and varsity levels so they’ve given high importance to taking small steps with each practice and game. At the same time, seniors will play a key role in that improvement with senior Alyssa Moran running the middle with Mary Lou Mixon’s blocking and defensive strengths, Paige Hultz’s back row play, and Ashlea Williams’ utility role as someone who can play a number of different positions on the court.

While Park Hill’s focus is on a strong defense, they know success will require an offensive counter-attack.

“Our defense is looking great, the girls are learning to read hitters better,” Hood said. “That first week, I had to step back and ask whether we had enough offense because our hitters weren’t really connecting as much as I wanted. We’ve incorporated more into our practices now, but we don’t necessarily have a go to hitter yet.”

Next week the Trojans will host their inaugural Dig for a Cure game against Liberty North at Park Hill. The September 21st benefit game will race money for the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure Foundation and Camp Quality. Proceeds will be raised through t-shirt sales and raffle drawings at the game. The special jerseys that players will wear for the game have been donated.

“That will be a really big game, the girls are really excited,” Hood said. “We still need to treat it like any other game, but it’s an extremely great cause.”