22 Souderton student-athletes announce college choices
FRANCONIA >>It’s an extreme sense of accomplishment when a high school athlete can officially say they’ve excelled to a high enough level to continue their career at the next stage.
Tuesday morning, 22 students gathered with their family and friends at Souderton Area High School to announce their decision to play a collegiate sport after their careers as Indians come to an end.
In all, 13 different sports were represented at the press conference, showing the wide range and diversity of athletic success throughout the school.
Lacrosse, field hockey and water polo had the most student representatives in attendance (3), and each were extremely excited to have such a large turnout.
Cory Azeff, who will be attending Neumann University in the fall, was one of the lacrosse players there announcing his decision, and his head coach was the first to point out that while Neumann will be getting a great player on the field, they’ll be getting an even better leader in the locker room.
“He’s just a great leader.” said Souderton lacrosse head coach Mark Princehorn when asked about Azeff. “On the field, off the field, to see him running with the lacrosse guys in sprints, encouraging his teammates, just an all around leader and the leader you want as a captain and I’m glad that he’s our captain.”
That was the theme for most of these players, while they certainly separated themselves from their competition on the field, the most impressive part of their game’s seemed to be the way they lead their teammates off of it, through example and extreme work ethic.
“Matt’s a great kid, very coachable, works very hard, and we’ve watched him develop since his 9th grade year coming through,” said Souderton baseball coach Mike Childs of his center fielder Matthew Reinert, who will be attending Wilkes University to pursue baseball. “He’ll be a great addition to the Wilkes staff, he’s the projected starting center fielder for us, we clocked him yesterday and he’s the fastest kid in the program for us and that’s another thing, as far as base running, that’s always nice to have too.”
Souderton’s wrestling team had just one member in attendance, in Philip Stolfi, but that didn’t stop head coach Tristan Boyd from making sure everyone knew how special of an athlete Stolfi was, in particular his work ethic.
“What made him (Stolfi) good was that he set a goal and he went out and basically just attacked it,” said Boyd. “He was always extremely coachable. After every single match, whether he won or he lost, the first thing he did was come over and say ‘what can I do to get better coach?’ and it wasn’t just to save face, he did it because he wanted to get better.”
Athletics is just part of the reason these athletes chose their schools, the other, and perhaps more important part, is how they fit in the academic side of the college they pick.
Quinn Guzman, who will be attending Embry-Riddell University to play golf, said the main reason he chose to go there was because of the golf team’s outstanding academic track record.
“My final decision came down to West Chester, Seton Hall, University of Nebraska, IUPUI, Cal State Fullerton, Purdue, and Embry-Riddell,” said Guzman. “I chose Embry-Riddell because they actually have the highest team GPA of any NCAA golf team and they also have a great engineering program.”
No matter what the reason they chose their respective school, all 22 student-athletes have accomplished the ultimate goal for high school sports, succeeding at a high enough level to be able to continue their career at the University of their choice.
