Every week stories are printed about the varsity teams at Garfield and their accomplishments, or lack there of. Everybody knows what is going on at the top levels of each sport. But what about those younger junior varsity teams? They play just as hard as the varsity teams, and log just as many hours at practice. Finally, the JV squads get the recognition that they deserve.

Baseball

The story of the year for this team is the new head coach Rey Delgado, a former member to the Puerto Rican National Softball team, who is curse word-happy. Delgado has raised some controversy after yelling at the team when they were losing to their rivals Roosevelt. However, players insist that he is fun to play for.

Delgado keeps practices fun by having a nickname for everyone on his team. Led by Sophomores Mason “Kung Pow” Woo, Frankie “Kenny G” Pavia, Charlie “Charlie’s Angels” Beaudoin, and Robbie “Goggles” Low, the Bulldogs have managed to escape with a few key wins against Bothell and Ballard.

However, they lack depth at many positions due to a small 13-man roster. Some of the losses can be attributed to not enough quality pitchers, as the team only has 4. Despite this, the boys have played well in almost every game. “We have lead in most games and are always competitive” Said Woo. With the varsity baseball team being mostly composed of terrific seniors, this group of young talented players will have to rise to the top next year.

Girls Tennis

If you drive past the Cherry street tennis courts next to the old Garfield, you can find this large group of girls practicing everyday after school. Practice begins with a lap around the court followed by one minute of warming up. After this, the girls play games like “Queen of the Court” or a shortened tournament based on their rankings on the team.

Led by Juniors Alexis Trione and Morgan Packer this team has the most depth of any Garfield sport. No cuts were made during tryouts, making the roster exceptionally enormous this year. Although this means that nobody’s feelings got hurt, it is not necessarily beneficial to all of the players. Some days at practices, there are 40 players cramped onto the 2 courts that the JV team has reserved, making progress a difficult thing to achieve. Many players resort to private lessons in order to prepare themselves for the matches. With a large influx of freshmen and sophomores, expect great things from the tennis team in the next couple of years.

Boys Soccer

This team has a lot to live up to as the varsity squad sits atop the KingCo conference. Sophomores Leo Friedman, and Colin Mang, along with Freshman Josh Canova and stellar Senior defender Gus Friedman, make a solid core of players and the head coach, Kyle Taetro, is very well liked by his players. This seems like a recipe for success but so far the boys have struggled.

The Bulldogs got off to a hot start with wins over rivals Franklin and Juanita. However, inconsistency has made it hard for them to get in a winning rhythm. Some players have missed games due to school related trips and on one occasion, a key defender Pape Mbafthe, was called up to varsity, throwing off the teams morale, leading to their worst defeat of the season.

Despite this, the players still keep a positive outlook on their season. “We are just trying to pick things up,” said Mang. “We want to be as dominant as varsity.”

Although they don’t get a box score in the paper, these teams all go out and represent Garfield High. They aren’t playing at the top tier of their sport but it doesn’t matter because every JV player has one thing in common: a bright future.