Isn’t being part of history fun! What a great week for Lincoln Water Polo; starting with more All-Metro Team nominations than at any time in our history on top of advancing further into the State Championships than ever before. What an achievement for Team!
Team is awesome. Team is what makes these players get up at 5am and enjoy it – mostly! Team, I must admit, gets me out of bed most mornings! Without Team we fail to achieve greatness.
We stand on the shoulders of giants. Giants are people like Anita Stark, Jim Claypool and Matt and Kayoko Kaye; they are bedrock of the program.
We have giants in our table workers. During the pre-season when all things were nebulous, we had folks like Roya and Dave Boston that decided this season was important enough to host all of our athletes and parents to a pre-season mixer that kicked us off. Lincoln giants are people like the Wagy’s who hosted 12 girls to a pre-state dinner as well as Jim Stark and Jim Geringer who decided to film our girls’ games, yet they only have boys on the team. We can go on, Quennevilles’ hosted the girls’ initiation – apparently this is a “dirty word” in today’s high school – I would say done appropriately, this is invaluable to team building.
Similarly, we have giants in the Marnoch-Carey family, who plan to host the JV guys and then the entire Lincoln squad of girls and guys; two events in one week – is this not phenomenal? John and Pauline Garney met me during the middle of a random Wednesday to pick up our shot clocks in order to make sure they ran properly for our very important MAC home game! Who does this?! The answer is simply our Lincoln family and if you are not involved at this point, please find a way to contribute.
I must admit, I am a bit torn when it comes to individual awards for team sports. I know they are necessary as resume builders as well as providing a nice confidence boost to individual players, on the other hand, every single person on a team contributes to these achievements; a contribution that must not be forgotten.
Team provides for success at the individual level. I don’t think this statement can ring more true so I reiterate, TEAM provides the vehicle for an individual to have success. In all team sports there is only one way to be successful, play as a team
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Having said that, please know I fight hard during our selection committee meeting to paint the best portrait of each member of our team. The following Lincoln polo players owe a huge thanks to their teammates and they are…drum roll!
Mackenzie Perkins – Player of the Year, All-Metro League
Steven Geringer – Player of the Year, All-Metro League
Megan Wagy – First Team, All-Metro League
Meg Claypool – First Team, All-Metro League
Jon Stark – Second Team, All-Metro League
Natalie Quenneville – Second Team, All-Metro League
Kai Geringer – Second Team, All-Metro League
Megan Armstrong – Third Team, All-Metro League
Similarly to the above, coaches cannot do it without Team! I thank each and every one of you, from alumni to parents to currents, for giving me the opportunity to play a roll in your lives. Because of your dedication to this sport and your loyalty to this program, you have given me two Metro League Coach of the Year awards in 2010 – thank you. My heart is full going into Championships this weekend!
WE BELIEVE!
Jeff
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