Port Chester gears up for winter season inside and out with preseason practice ending & 6 teams raring to go
December 4, 2024 at 10:38 p.m.
With the cold winds of December setting in, the ins and outs of the wind chill factor have come into play as the Port Chester teams warm-up practices heat up on their way into the start of regular winter season play Thursday (12/4).
Each of the six Ram and Lady Ram winter season teams geared up for the get-go in different ways in different places in an inside/outside approach to the starting line.
For the basketball, wrestling and cheerleading teams, the practices take place in the relative warmth of the high school gym.
Sophomore Alyssa Gagnon dribbles to the hoop in the Port Chester girls’ basketball team’s Monday, Dec. 2 home scrimmage against Briarcliff in preparation for the 2024-25 season.By Joseph DeCarlo
For the euphemistically named indoor winter season Track & Field team, practices occur on the outdoor quarter-mile track.
For the bowlers, the winter season means a schlep to Bowlerland near Co-Op City in the Bronx.
And for the swimming Rams, there are pre-school training sessions in the waters of their Carver Center home pool.
Hoop-di-do doings
"It is what it is," veteran Lady Rams basketball coach Danny Davis said Monday (12/2), his team a work in progress as they prepared to take the floor in a scrimmage against Briarcliff in the new gym.
What Davis was basically saying is you do what you have to do to get ready for the upcoming season wherever you have to do it because the early winter season practices are essentially a time to get to know what you have—and what you don't have—in terms of players and roster strength.
Kimberly Flores, Daniela Lopez and Elizabeth Cruz, members of the Lady Rams indoor Track & Field team, work on their strides on the Port Chester High School track in preparation for the 2024-25 season.By Joseph DeCarlo
So the Briarcliff scrimmage was a pre-season proving ground, more or less.
And as Davis looked around, he saw what he had and what he didn't have. Because there on the bench was one of his best and most experienced players, senior Karah Provenzano, nursing a sprained ankle she hoped would be better by the time the Lady Rams opened their season Thursday (12/5) at 4:30 p.m. at Rye Neck in a multi-team tournament that also included Keio and Hamilton.
The missing links
Without Kara Pro out there scrimmaging, Davis was checking out a team that revolves around his "Big" in veteran senior Elise Thomas and such promising players as Isabella Lopez, Melissa Gagnon, Julia Wolff, Aliyah Salmon, Sophia Faraci and Gianna Rende, a sophomore All-Section soccer player who looked like the ball handler and scorer he was looking for.
And Davis is certainly looking for one because he has to replace his wunderkind point guard McKayla McLoughlin who started for him for two years but transferred out as a freshman to attend Mercersburg, a Pennsylvania prep school powerhouse, to enhance her college athletic scholarship potential. She was following in the footsteps of one of the Lady Rams’ all-time greats Kayleigh Heckel, who transferred to nationally-ranked Long Island Lutheran, a move that paid off because she is now playing for the University of Southern California, one of the country's top-rated teams.
Later, on the same gym floor after the scrimmage, second year Rams coach Greg Cole, a former high school and collegiate hotshot, was putting his team though their paces, facing many of the same problems as Davis. Cole is also trying to replace his graduated All-Conference point guard Guillermo (Memo) Zabala, who set a school single-game scoring record of 60 points against Hamilton last year and is now at Arizona State, while trying to revive a losing Rams hoops culture.
The Rams’ great hopes
Cole was paying close attention to a potential starting five drawn from players like seniors Angel Meta, Carmello Thompson, Josel Sigua, Shan Cheriyan and Ranbir Singh, juniors Walquidi Valerio Sosa, Jeremy Noel and Andrew Abraham and sophomores Justin Tenezaca and Chris Martin.
And, like Davis, Cole will have a better idea of what he has when the Rams play in the same Rye Neck Tournament against the same teams (Keio and Hamilton) on the same day (Thursday, 12/4), albeit with a later 6 p.m. start. And, depending on how things go, there will be a consolation round Saturday at 10 a.m. for the Rams and noon for the Lady Rams with the championship game set for 2 p.m. for the boys’ finals with the girls taking the floor at 4 p.m.
While all this basketball was going on, something very different was happening in the older part of the same Port Chester High School building, high above the gym. There ex-Ram triple threat great Joe Facciola (football, baseball, All-Section wrestler), now the Rams’ head wrestling coach and a physical education instructor in the Port Chester School District, was supervising a record turnout of 87 wrestlers.
That's right up there with T&F for the most student-athletes trying out for any Port Chester team.
How it works out
"Twice a week we split our team in two (lightweights and heavyweights), so while half does some strength and conditioning in the weight room with our strength and conditioning coach, Corey Crane, the other half is on the mat wrestling or doing a workout outdoors or in the halls," he explained in describing how those numbers become manageable. "Splitting the team throughout practices allows us to offer more individualized time on the mat while maintaining safety in more complex drills."
Danny Alvarado, another former Ram wrestling great who has won three consecutive league championships as the Lady Rams soccer coach and is the head Lady Rams T&F coach outdoors, is back on the mat working with Facciola, better known as Joe Fatch in wrestling circles, as an assistant coach.
The mats matter
On this day, in various parts of the wrestling domain, seniors Andres Sanchez and Fabian Avalos were completing Crane's circuit weights workout, junior Jonathan Tenesaca was drilling on single leg takedowns on senior Brian Fernandez, seniors Eduar Polanco and Daniel Martello were doing squat jumps and pushups as part of their circuit workout, freshman Jeancarlo Gonzalez was doing jumping jacks, and Christopher Quito was demonstrating a spin drill move on Nicholas Pereira.
On and on it went like a wrestling three-ring circus that included starring acts like ultra-promising freshman Laila Builes (last year's Rookie of the Year and a threat to become Port Chester's first ever state champion) and A.J. Alvarez, another potential champion, sophomore Jacob Lopez (last year's JV wrestler of the year) and inspirational advice coming from experienced veterans like Pereira and Polanco, both potential All-Section candidates.
After all their practices, the Rams are raring to go in their first meet Saturday (12/7), a multi-school tournament at Harrison at 9:30 a.m.
On the run again
In the nearby auxiliary gym room 143, cheerleaders were practicing their pyramids and stunts. And outside the T&F team was running in circles on the track, here a sprint, there a jog, plus long strides cutting through the biting wind. As all this and more was going on around him, new Rams head T&F coach Chris Halstead, also the Rams football coach, roamed the area in hoodie and shorts seemingly oblivious to the cold. At one point he lined up his sprinters at 25-yard intervals from the football goal line so they could take off at full tilt and practice stick passes with the precision that could mean the difference between winning or losing in a relay.
Senior Christopher Quito demonstrates a spin drill on senior Nicolas Pereira as head wrestling coach Joseph Facciola observes during practice in the wrestling room above the PCHS gym last week. A record 87 wrestlers came out for the team.By Joseph DeCarlo
Nearby, new Lady Rams head coach Cindy Reyes Martinez, also the cross-country coach and a former Lady Rams middle distance great, was working with the team's distance runners including smooth-striding sophomore half-miler Christopher Zamora while new assistant coach Rich Laconi, a PCHS teacher, shouted encouragement as runners of assorted shapes, sizes and speeds passed by doing their thing. At different times and speeds there were Nicholas Wolff, Marc Dorsainvil and Ayden Richmond racing through speed drills, Kimberly Flores, Daniela Lopez and Elizabeth Cruz working on their strides, and Bryan Rivera and Fatima Coyt (one of the Lady Rams tennis team's tri-captains) doing repetitions to build the power in their legs.
They will almost certainly be among the runners to get their first chance to test their legs in the season's opening meet Friday (12/6) at The Armory in New York City at 5 p.m.
Carver Center splish splashing
On and on it goes on this magical mystery tour of Port Chester winter season practices, moving on to the Carver Center where inspirational Rams head swimming coach Colleen Cahill, a former Fordham/Marymount collegiate swimmer, was conducting tryouts. She is looking to try to replace 17 graduated seniors with the 18 recruits splashing around her, eyeing them with the patience that comes from being a remedial education teacher in the Port Chester School District. She was pleased with what she was seeing because her talented returnees include seniors Christian Yupangui and Anthony Labella, juniors Tiernan McLoughlin, Jacobo Gordillo and Santiago Marquez (the former All-League x-country runner who is also one of the best swimmers in school history), and sophomores Brandon Moody, Daniel Recinos and Sergio Morales.
The newcomers include seven freshmen, a sophomore, junior and senior.
All of which has Cahill thinking her team shows a lot of promise while looking forward to their first regular season test coming up Tuesday (12/10) at home against Woodlands at 4:30 p.m. That's the team her Lady Ram swimmers tied for third place in the fall season Conference championships—Port Chester's highest finish ever. So, when she says: "I think we have the makings of a very good Rams team," you listen because she knows what she is talking about.
Bowling ups, downs
Finally, even farther away from the high school and the Carver Center, at Bowlerland near Co-Op City, in the Bronx to be exact, veteran Rams coach Jeanine Maiolini, a former college athletic scholarship infielder on the nationally-ranked Hofstra University softball team, was working on teaching her keglers how to throw balls and strikes right down the alley. And so far so good with juniors Franklyn Cando and Austin Nij looking like the best returning bowlers while sophomore Isabella Molina and junior Emily Garcia are shaping up as the leading ladies in the early going.
But Maiolini, who also coaches the Lady Rams softball team and turned around a losing culture, knows a lot can happen in a season, and she is looking for good things to happen with a talented roster that includes Rams seniors Demera Nazir and Tony Nievecela, junior Alejandro Mojica, sophomores Gabriel Tellez and Iazeyah Fentress, and freshman Evin Eski and Oscar Morales while the Lady Rams squad revolves around senior Kaitlyn Faria, juniors Britney Larrosa, Elizabeth Campos and Sofia Greco.
Seniors Julian Estevez and Edwin Cruz perform squat jumps in the body weight circuit portion of wrestling practice in the weight room at PCHS last week.By Joseph DeCarlo
The bowlers jumped the gun on their start to the season with a loss to Harrison Monday (12/2). But they will get their next shot at breaking into the win column against New Rochelle next Monday (12/9) at 3 p.m., with all matches at Bowlerland.
That brings to an end this long day's journey into night following a typical Rams and Lady Rams regular winter training cycle as they gear up for the season that lies ahead, inside, outside, all around the town. Will it be a winter of discontent? Or will it lead to winning seasons and postseason All-Star selections? Who knows. But whatever happens, W or L, rain, wind or snow, it is show time as well as snow time, and let the games begin.
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