It was the year of the world champion, the NCAA Division 1
champion, the resurrected quarterback and so much more.
Gilroy-It was the year of the world champion, the NCAA Division 1 champion, the resurrected quarterback and so much more.
Picking the top 10 sports stories of 2006 is a subjective task at best. But the Dispatch has attempted to do just that. The events are not in any particular order.
1-Rise and fall (or was it) of the Ghost
Robert Guerrero brought the International Boxing Federation title belt to Gilroy when he punished Eric Aiken for eight rounds Sept. 2 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. When Aiken couldn’t answer the ninth bell, Guerrero was the world champion.
Nine weeks later, Guerrero relinquished the belt to Orlando Salido after losing a 12-round unanimus decision. But Salido’s tenure as champion was much shorter than Guerrero’s when he tested positive for steroids. That put Guerrero back in line for another world title fight against Spend Abazi, expected in Denmark in February 2007.
2-No. 2 but not for long
Jeff Garcia got no promises when he signed a one-year deal with the Philadelphia Eagles last March except for one – as long as Donovan McNabb was healthy, the former GHS, Gavilan and San Jose State star would be riding the bench. McNabb made it for 10 games.
When McNabb went down with a season-ending knee injury, the call went out to Garcia. His numbers were good in a loss to Indianapolis that put the Eagles on the cusp of playoff elimination. And then on national television, Garcia carved up Carolina’s vaunted defense and helped Philadelphia to its biggest win of the season, 27-24. The first-half boos were replaced by second-half cheers by the fickle Philly fans. Garcia was rock-solid a week later in a 21-19 win over Washington, and even better in leading the Eagles past the Giants, 36-22.
3-Where did this team come from?
In midseason, University of California-Santa Barbara’s men’s soccer team was virtually dead with a 7-6 record, and former GHS star Alfonso Motagalvan was uncertain whether he was even at the right school. Coach Tim Vom Steeg was promising wholesale changes if the team didn’t right itself immediately.
A team that wasn’t even a playoff-caliber team in mid-October celebrated an unlikely national championship the first week of December. Motagalvan, who had been buried for several games on the Gauchos’ bench, was UCSB’s 90-minute man during the 2-1 win over UCLA in the championship game, even saving a goal as a defender.
4-We’re No. 5 and getting better
Getting to the World Series is getting to be a habit for the Gilroy Little League Girls’ Major team. The team did it for the second straight year last summer.
While Gilroy found runs hard to come by, it pushed across the only one it needed against Cedar Mill, Ore., in a 1-0 win that gave the locals fifth place in the nation, one spot better than than their 2005 run. How close did the Northern California Little League softball champions come to a run to the top? Gilroy lost 1-0 to eventual champion Central of Mattawan, Mich.
5-Leaving Gilroy … and then Fresno
Armando Gonzalez and Adin Duenas were excited about continuing their wrestling careers at Fresno State. And why not? The Bulldogs had been a competitive program for many years.
With scholarships in hand, the two GHS stars were eager to get started. And then came word that Fresno had dropped wrestling. Talk about being all dressed up with nowhere to go. But Gonzalez and Duenas did find somewhere else to go. They are now wrestling at California State-Fullerton.
6-Second best has this Hunter hungry.
As a freshman, Hunter Collins was the first-ever GHS grappler to place as a freshman at the state meet. As a sophomore, he came within three points of being the school’s first state champion since 1987.
Collins, a nationally ranked 171-pounder, made it all the way to the state final. Top-ranked Louis Bland rallied in the final 35 seconds with two takedowns for an 8-5 decision to bring down Collins’ hopes of a state title.
As for the Mustangs, they made a mockery of the Central Coast Section meet by scoring the most team points ever.
7-Reno, or bust.
Clayton Johnson was the epitome of a student-athlete, carrying a 3.98 grade point average in the classroom and being highly decorated on the football field.
The 6-4, 300-pound offensive lineman from Morgan Hill was heavily recruited and committed to University of Nevada-Reno with a full scholarship in hand. He followed in the footsteps of Bradley Niles (University of Nevada-Las Vegas) and T.J. Monroe (University of Texas-El Paso) as Gavilan players taking it to the NCAA Division 1 level.
8-Scholars and athletes
Gilroy’s cross country team not only excelled on the running course but in the classroom. In fact, this is one group of scholar-athletes that can legitimately claim “We’re No. 1.”
The tandem of Megan Litle, Kristina Schmidt, Annie Donahoe, Christine Bobula, Kathleen Miller, Paty Hernandez and Brandie Rodriguez combined for a 3.9545 grade point average that was better than any other CCS fall athletic team.
For good measure, Miller also qualified individually for the CIF State Cross Country Championships.
9-The new kids in town
There was much abuzz about Gilroy’s boys basketball team entering the 2006-07 season. It took a while before anyone knew if there would be anything to the buzz about since the Central Coast Section studied the circumstances surrounding the moves of Spencer Ford, Lorenzo Dobson and Javin Charlot to GHS.
After sitting out the first two games, the three were in uniform for the Mustangs last two games of the Aptos Seascape Invitational. GHS won the tournament and Charlot was Most Valuable Player. The Mustangs came up short a week later in the loaded West Coast Classic at Valley Christian, but came back a week later to dominate the Bob Hagen Memorial Tournament with Charlot against garnering MVP honors.
10-Welcome back … you were missed
The Avis Kelley Invitational returned after a one-year absence. Twenty-seven track and field teams competed in an improved event that locals said boasted its strongest field in years.
There was so much more that could have made the list, like former Gavilan golfer John Ellis qualifying for the AT&T Classic, GHS soccer coach Brian Hall getting his third selection as Referee of the Year in Major League Soccer, Rich Hammond taking over as head football coach at GHS, Anthony Figueroa repeating what his father, Angel, did 33 years earlier (at 139 pounds) in winning the Golden Gloves 125-pound weight class in the Novice Division, the Gilroy girls and boys basketball teams winning Tri-County Athletic League championships in the same season for the first time in memory, Bobby Best moving on to Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo after a storied GHS career and the restructuring of athletics at Gavilan – the Rams had just three athletic teams combined during the 2006 fall and winter seasons. Even the weather was in the news with more March rainouts than anyone wanted to remember.
2006 was, indeed, a year to remember for Gilroy.
