The fall sports season entered its second full week with all four Blaine varsity teams seeing action.
Cross-country ran its first official race of the season in the Gear Up Northwest Preview meet at Civic Stadium in Bellingham. Girls soccer earned its first win of the season with a 2-0 home win over Lakewood. Football improved to 2-0 with a lopsided win against Cedar Park Christian, and volleyball fell to 0-3.
After a 42-12 stomping of Cedar Park Christian at home on September 13, the Borderites look like one of the most improved teams in the Northwest Conference since last season.
Head coach Andy Olson said starting off 2-0 builds confidence early in the season, but there is still much to improve upon.
“We did some things better week two than we did week one,” Olson said. “We still need to clean up, but it’s obviously great from a confidence standpoint for our kids.”
The defense – led by a stellar defensive end duo of captain Blake Koreski and Zi Yu – put up another gem, tallying multiple sacks and holding the opposing offense to negative rushing yards for the second game in a row.
Koreski, who moved from middle linebacker to defensive end in the offseason, showed out with six tackles, two tackles for loss, one sack, and a forced fumble and fumble recovery.
Head coach Andy Olson said Koreski’s position change is an example of his and defensive coordinator Troy Anderson’s effort to fit the defensive scheme to a player’s natural talents, not the other way around.
“We’re going to adapt how we do things based on the athletes that we have and trying to put them in positions to be their best self,” Olson said. “What we saw from Blake is, man, this kid really does have an incredible motor, he can really explode off the line of scrimmage.”
Koreski and the rest of the defense – a rotation of roughly 15 veteran varsity players, Olson said – are looking like they can stop the run of plenty of good teams, which is the first step for winning consistently in a tough, physical Northwest Conference.
The Borderites opened the scoring on the game with a punt return touchdown by junior Kai Kerwin, who made multiple special team defenders miss on his way to the first punt return touchdown for Blaine since 2001, according to WhatcomPreps.com.
Yet again, the Borderites ran the ball extremely well, rushing 41 times for 297 total yards compared to just eight pass attempts for 36 total yards.
For the second week in a row, senior Jaiden Paez led the game in rushing yards with 174 on just nine carries. Paez finished the game with four rushing touchdowns, with fellow seniors Colby Shipp and Colin Davis each rushing for a touchdown as well.
Blaine sits at 2-0 on the young season and will make its longest trip of the year when the team travels to Chelan for a game on Friday, September 20 at 6 p.m.
Olson said the long travel day will be a good challenge for his Borderites.
“It’ll be a great test for us to see if we can be mentally tough enough to go ride a bus for five hours, get there a little early […] get dialed in and locked in and go play football and do our job,” Olson said. “That’s what’s kind of fun about these road trips.”
Stats provided by WhatcomPreps.com
Blaine girls soccer earned its first win of the season during the first home game with a 2-0 shutout of Northwest Conference rival Lakewood on September 12.
The Borderites’ first goal came after a long shot by sophomore forward Nevaeh Zaddack took a wild deflection off a Lakewood defender, the ball looping perfectly over the goalkeeper’s head and in, just before the halftime whistle blew.
In the second half, the Borderite defense stayed sound, and allowed for senior goalkeeper Larissa Pluschakov to earn her first assist on the year when a free kick made it to junior midfielder Brietta Sandell for a game-sealing goal.
The Borderites went into the past weekend 1-1-0 after a 6-3 season opening loss to Oak Harbor, and were again unable to get a win on the road with a 4-0 loss to Squalicum on September 17.
Head coach Gio Quesada said that although the team is young and has been conceding goals, this year’s team is also very physical and aggressive on both sides of the ball.
“Everything is going to be about learning, experience and improvement,” Quesada said. “One thing from last year is our team has a huge improvement in their physicality and communication. Every 50-50 ball they anticipate and play well, especially the defense – they’re very strong.”
Strength – and roster depth – will be needed this week as the Borderites play three games in three days: September 17 against Squalicum, September 18 against La Conner, and September 19 against rivals Lynden Christian.
Northwest Conference opponents Lynden Christian have given the Borderites trouble in recent seasons, with the Borderites going 0-3 against the Lyncs last season, including a playoff exit with a state tournament berth on the line.
“We’re taking it day by day,” Quesada said of the current stretch of games. “We’ll go and try to use the most energy we can, and I think that will happen by itself because [Lynden Christian] are our rivals.”
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