Sports

The Live Oak High and Sobrato High boys soccer teams are both confident they’ll be stronger in the second half of the Blossom Valley League West Valley Division season. The Acorns were 1-1-5 and the Bulldogs 1-4-2 in league after the two squads played to a 1-1 draw on Jan. 22.

In just the second game of the season, the Sobrato High girls basketball team faced one of the best teams in the nation in St. Mary’s of Stockton. The result was rather predictable, as the Bulldogs fell, 80-22. It was an experience unlike any other, as a stacked St. Mary’s squad filled with Division I prospects lit up the scoreboard with remarkable ease.

Live Oak High boys basketball coach Jeff Yeung purposely made a tough non-league schedule to prepare his team to win the Blossom Valley League West Valley Division championship. The third-year Acorns coach knew the team was going to take its bruises, yet hopeful the players would grow stronger from the experience.

Despite entering the season without two projected starters, the Sobrato High boys basketball team hasn’t let that deter it from having its best start in coach Sean Tate’s fourth year at the helm. The Bulldogs won eight of their first 12 games before entering the tough Blossom Valley League’s Mount Hamilton Division.

As a quarterback, Erik Ornduff is used to making quick decisions on the field. Apparently, the 2016 Live Oak High graduate is equally quick when it comes to making next level decisions. On Jan. 5 in Durango, Ornduff signed his letter of intent to play at Fort Lewis College in Colorado.

Javier Torres is his own worst critic. In a 25-minute phone interview with the Times, Torres on three occasions used the work “choke” in describing some of his past performances, including a recent second-place showing in the Webber Lawson Memorial Tournament at Fremont High in Sunnyvale.

Tony Vasquez is in his 20th season as the coach of the Live Oak High girls soccer team, and there’s something noticeably different at the Acorns’ games this year.

Dallas and Derek Jensen vividly remember the individual 1-on-1 times they had with their dad, Kort, from the time they were adolescents into their college years. Most of those moments—they number in the thousands—took place at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Gilroy, the city in which all of them currently reside.

Harrison Zhang has made tremendous improvement since his freshman season. It’s no surprise considering his rock-solid mindset approach to training. The Sobrato High senior takes pride in being mentally tough. 

First let me say that this column is probably more for me than anything else, so please forgive me in advance as I take a few column inches to reflect on my time doing something that I love.