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Thursday, August 28, 2008

Manzano Starts With New Coach

By Harold Smith
Mountain View Telegraph
          Take a deep breath, pick yourself up, dust yourself off and start all over again.
        The Manzano High girls soccer team will begin anew in 2008 with yet another coach. The Lady Monarchs, with former coach Lalania Kolek at the helm, were 12-10, 4-4 in District 5-5A, and went 1-1 in World Cup-format pool play at the state tournament in 2007.
        "This is my third coach in my four years at Manzano," said Samantha Gardner, the Monarchs' 5-foot-5 senior goalkeeper. "I think, in some ways, it's made us a better team. It always takes a while to figure out what each coach's standards are. We've had to rely on each other as a team. But I think it'll be good this year."
        The woman in the hot seat this time is Jodie Clarke, who under her maiden name of Robertson was an all-state soccer player for Sandia High when the Matadors won the state Class 5A title in 2000. She also had a brief collegiate stint at West Texas A&M.
        "We have a new coach, I think the atmosphere's better, and we're more optimistic," said 5-6 senior midfielder Mallory McCampbell, who hails from Sandia Park. "We really love Jodie."
        Clarke teaches physical education at the school. She is the daughter-in-law of Manzano swimming coach Tammy Wilson.
        Clarke was an assistant coach at Eldorado prior to taking the Monarchs' position.
        "I think as long as we stay healthy, we'll be competitive," she said during a practice last week. "The main thing is they want to be here, and they want to get better."
        Manzano senior forward Monquisha Coleman is the two-time reigning state champion in the long jump.
        East Mountains residents include Rebecca Garduño, a 5-8 junior from Tijeras; Kelsey McCoy, a 5-7 junior from Cedar Crest; Salomé Perez, a 5-2 sophomore from Sandia Park; Andrea Maynez, a 5-3 freshman from Sandia Park; and Kylie Weirick, a 5-4 freshman from Tijeras.
        "I think we're going to have a real good year," McCampbell said. "But we still need to get in better shape. We're a pretty small team so we won't have a lot of subs."
        Sandia Prep, the 2007 Class 1A-3A state runner-up, defeated Manzano 4-0 in group-B play of the Albuquerque Public Schools Metro Championships at the Farmers Insurance Soccer Complex near Bernalillo on Monday. The Monarchs, also in group B, played Volcano Vista in a late game Wednesday.
        Manzano boys
        New Monarchs coach Tristan Lloyd, who graduated from Manzano in 2006, played soccer for the Purple Pride and grew up in the East Mountains, will give it the old college try.
        Lloyd, 20, will simultaneously tackle his full 17-hour class load as a student at the University of New Mexico and the management of a bunch of teens in the game of soccer.
        "It's a lot more busy work than I expected," said Lloyd, a junior accounting major. "But it should be fun."
        Manzano's Daniel Lloyd, the coach's brother, scored in the 50th minute to give his team a 1-0 victory over West Mesa in group A play of the APS metro tourney at FISC on Tuesday. Albuquerque Academy beat the Monarchs 4-0 in a group matchup on Monday.
        Manzano's East Mountains residents include Joey Abrams, a 5-5, 125-pound junior midfielder from Tijeras; Max Cotton, a 5-10, 130-pound junior defender from Yrisarri; Daniel Lloyd, a 5-9, 150-pound junior forward from the Sedillo area; and Logan Richards, a 6-foot, 160-pound junior defender from Tijeras. Lloyd transferred from Eldorado.
        "We've got a lot of work to do since there were no summer workouts (due to the coach's late hire)," Richards said. "But we're starting off well, doing better every day."
        The 2007 Monarchs were 5-14-1, 1-7 in district under former coach Brett Tomlinson. Tomlinson, who moved to Colorado, also resigned his position as the school's athletic director.