District 2 of the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association will be represented in the London Olympic Games, which are scheduled to officially open Friday.
Dallas High School graduate Paige Selenski is part of the women’s field hockey team.
District 2 covers the northeastern part of the state, including Susquehanna County. Dallas is part of the Wyoming Valley Conference, which includes Elk Lake and Montrose in field hockey.
More than half the U.S. Olympic women’s field hockey team– nine of 16 players – is from Pennsylvania.
Selenski made the Olympic team when the national team roster was trimmed to the number of players to be used in London. Two other District 2 players –former Wyoming Seminary teammates Kat Sharkey and Kelsey Kolejejchick were among the last players cut.
The next closest athlete among those from Pennsylvania is Casey Eichfeld, a 22-year-old from Drums, near Hazleton, who is a member of the canoe/kayak Olympic team for the second time.
Soccer is the only sport to be contested prior to Friday, which is the night of the Opening Ceremonies.
Nicole Barnhart, the back-up goalkeeper on the U.S. women’s team which will be among the first in action Wednesday, is from Gilbertsville.
Pennsylvania has a total of 35 athletes on U.S. Olympic rosters, matching New York for the second most, behind California.
The most famous among them is Kobe Bryant, who went straight from Lower Merion High School in the Philadelphia suburbs to the National Basketball Association. Bryant is hoping to be part of a gold-medal winning men’s basketball team for the second straight time.
Swin Cash, from McKeesport, near Pittsburgh, is on the women’s basketball team.
Trevor Barron, Ryan Whiting, Hyleas Fountain and Lauryn Williams will compete in track and field.
Varvara Lepchenko and Lisa Raymond are part of the women’s tennis team.
Brendan Hansen is part of the men’s swimming team while Cassidy Krug is one of the women’s divers.
Wrestling, another sport where Pennsylvania is traditionally among the nation’s strongest states, will include Jake Herbert and Coleman Scott.
Christa Harmotto is on the women’s volleyball roster.
Selenski’s field hockey teammates include Kayla Bashore-Smedley, Lauren Crandall, Katelyn Falgowski, Katie O’Donnell, Keli Puzo Smith, Julia Reinprecht, Katie Reinprecht and Amy Swensen.
The other Olympians from the Keystone State are: Miles Chamley-Watson in fencing; Phillip Dutton and Boyd Martin in equestrian; Bobby Lea and Lauren Tamayo in cycling; Glenn Ochal, Natalie Dell and Susan Francia in rowing; Joshua Richmond in shooting; Kyle Vashkulat in judo; and Jamie Beyerle Gray in shooting.
While following U.S. results in London, Pennsylvanians can take pride in how many of their own will have a say in the nation’s success at the Olympic Games.
WEEK IN REVIEW
The Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees are leading the International League North Division for the first time in more than a year.
Brandon Laird and Cole Garner each drove in four runs while Kevin Russo had four hits Saturday in a 13-8 victory over the host Gwinnett Braves to put the team in the division lead.
The Yankees then beat Gwinnett, 4-3, on a ninth-inning Corban Joseph home run Sunday to move 12 games over .500 for the first time all season at 57-45. Saturday’s win, combined with losses by the Pawtucket Red Sox and Lehigh Valley IronPigs, put the Yankees in first place for the first time since May 16, 2011.
Garner, who went on to score two more runs, had a grand slam when the Yankees scored eight runs in the top of the first Saturday.
Laird was 3-for-4 with a homer.
Russo went 4-for-6 with a triple. He is batting .490 (24-for-49) during a 12-game hitting streak.
Elsewhere, Montrose graduate Rich Thompson had hits in eight of the last nine games for the Durham Bulls to raise his average to .286 in 31 games since being sent down by the Tampa Bay Rays.
Thompson went 1-for-3 with a run and a stolen base Sunday. He has stolen 10 bases with the Bulls and 17 overall in the IL, including his time with the Lehigh Valley IronPigs earlier this season.
THE WEEK AHEAD
The Keystone State Games open Friday in the Harrisburg-Hershey area and continue through August 5.
TOM ROBINSON writes a weekly local sports column for the Susquehanna County Transcript. He can be reached online at RobbyTR@aol.com or followed on Twitter at @tomjrobinson.
SADLER IS CHICAGO NATIONWIDE WINNER
JOLIET, Ill.—Elliott Sadler held off Ricky Stenhouse on a green-white-checkered finish to win Sunday’s Nationwide race.
His win also netted him an extra $100,000 in the Dash 4 Cash.
Sadler credits his recipe for success to his Richard Childress racing teammate, Austin Dillon.
“It's been fun,” Sadler said. “I know we're both running for a championship but it hasn't seemed to be that way. We've all been so much about helping each other. Our crews get along very well.
“When you walk into our shop, you see a lot of guys that work on Austin's car are putting my car together. Some of my guys are putting Austin's car together. It's a great mentality that we've built at the Nationwide shop at Childress. It's really one team with three drivers.
Elliott Sadler, Chicago Nationwide winner (Furnished by NASCAR)
“We meet after every practice. Everybody's sharing notes. It's pretty much: Let's help each other as much as we can, period, and let race adjustments dictate where we're going to finish. This is probably the best team I've been on in my career as far as everybody being so open-minded, so open-booked about helping each other as much as we can.”
Stenhouse led 200 of the 300 laps, but lost the lead to Sadler late in the race.
“He just got ahead of me on the restart and I couldn’t do anything with him,’ said Stenhouse. “We weren’t able to run the way we wanted to late in the race. I don’t know if it was the last set of tires, or whether the handling went away.”
Justin Allgaier, Kenny Wallace, Michael Annett, Austin Dillon, Parker Kligerman, Sam Hornish, Cole Whitt, and Ryan Truex were the remaining top-10 finishers.
Top-10 leaders after 18 of 33; 1. Sadler-675, 2. A. Dillon-664, 3. Stenhouse-656, 4. Hornish-633, 5. Allgaier-597, 6. Annett-569, 7. Whitt-550, 8. Bliss-491, 9. Patrick-443, 10. Scott-430.
BUESCHER MAKES REPAIRS AND WINS
When James Buescher was forced to pit to change carburetors during the course of Saturday night's truck race at Chicagoland, any chance of winning appeared lost, especially when he got back on track two laps down.
Buescher not only made up those two laps, he needed just one lap, the final one, to grab the lead and go on to win his NASCAR Camping World Truck Series-leading third race of the season at Chicagoland Speedway.
Leading just six laps in the entire event, Buescher passed points leader Timothy Peters and then held off Brendan Gaughan, who led 83 of the 150 laps, to win his second race in the last three events.
“We had issues early on where we kept losing power, so we decided to pit, changed the carburetor and the car came to life,” Buescher said. “From there, it was a matter of getting our laps back and going forward from there.”
And then, with a smile on his face, Buescher added, “We just had to pass 20 other trucks to win.”
Brendan Gaughan, Timothy Peters, Matt Crafton, Parker Kligerman, Cale Gale, Ron Hornaday, Jason Leffler, Jason White, and David Starr rounded out the top-10.
Top-10 leaders after 10 of 22: 1. Peters-395, 2. T. Dillon-372, 3. Lofton-365, 4. Buescher-360, 5. Klierman-346, 6. Crafton-345, 7. Hornaday-334, 8. Coulter-322, 9. Piquest-302, 10. White-295.
LOSS OF ARMY SPONSORSHIP WILL HURT
There has never been a time when the U. S. Military didn’t play some type of role in NASCAR.
From the pre-race ceremonies, which include aircraft flyovers, color guards, to giant American flags, to race car sponsorship, the presence of the military has always been evident.
But their participation may be limited in the future.
A bill introduced into Congress by Betty McCollum of Minnesota would have stripped $72-million from military branches that have budgeted for sports sponsorships in 2013 and the savings would go toward deficit reduction
The bill did fail, thanks to a 216-202 vote in the House of Representatives that will allow the military to continue sponsoring race teams.
The U.S. Army, which paid 8.3-million to sponsor Ryan Newman’s Stewart-Haas team, has announced it won’t return in 2013, and everyone wants to blame politics. But there are several other non-military sponsors that haven’t committed for 2013.
Army officials were quite candid about why they are leaving the sport—they said NASCAR produced some results for it but not enough.
“Seventy-two million bucks is a lot of money,” said Bill Harper, chief of staff for Rep. McCollum. “We're fine with the military advertising; we're fine with the military recruiting at these professional sports events, absolutely. That's not the intention of this amendment at all. The sponsorships are something completely different.
“With regards to sponsorship, the numbers don't demonstrate that it's effective. The Army's decision only validates that.”
The National Guard’s sponsorship of Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Hendricks Motorsports is producing up to 40 recruits a year, according to those working to ban the sponsorships.
The National Guard says it will continue to sponsor Earnhardt, because the age group they draw from is older (35-45 age group) than the Army.
NASCAR chief marketing officer Steve Phelps defended the military's involvement in NASCAR after the Army's announcement, saying: “NASCAR continues to be a powerful and critical part of the marketing mix for other branches of the U.S. Armed Forces and more Fortune 500 companies than any other sport.”
The funding cuts would have also affected the Indy Car Series, National Hot Rod Association, the Ultimate Fighting Championship and money spent on bass fishing tournaments.
The Army’s withdrawal further complicates matters for Newman. His contract is up at the end of the year and while he is still expected to re-sign, the loss of a third of the No. 39 car’s sponsorship dollars is going to hurt.
Weekend Racing: The Cup and Nationwide teams are at the 2.5-mile Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The trucks do not race again until Aug. 4.
Sat., July 28, Nationwide Indy 250, race 19 of 33; Starting time: 4 pm ET; TV: ESPN.
Sun., July 29, Sprint Cup Brickyard 400, race 20 of 36; Starting time: 12 noon ET; TV: ESPN.
Racing Trivia Question: Who was the only driver to win three consecutive NASCAR Cup championships? Hint. They came in 1976, ’77, ’78.
Last Week's Question: When was the first NASCAR race held at Indianapolis Motor Speedway? Answer. 1994. Jeff Gordon was the winner.
You may contact the Racing Reporter at hodges@race500.com.
