In football, there are elev-en players on the field with each offensive down. An over-looked but arguably the most important player on the field is the center. No one notices the center unless he messes up. “Sam Vanderslice was my first choice as a center be-cause I felt like he was a very dependable kid,” offensive line coach Matt Moore said. “He’s very tough and very scrappy, which you have to be as a center.” A center is at a disadvan-tage because he has to snap the ball while a lot of times they have someone right in their face. There’s a lot of tech-nique that goes into offensive line and the center has to get the job done. “One of the most impor-tant qualities for a center is to basically know the calls the quarterback is making and to make sure everyone on the line knows,” Vanderslice said. Vanderslice, a junior, has

a close relationship with the quarterback, senior Jadyn Kowalski, which consists of a lot of joking around and hang-ing out. Their relationship is

important because they in-teract frequently during the game. “He’s pretty important. He blocks for me he and blocks

what I can’t see,” Kowalski said. ”If he wasn’t there none of the yards I get my wide re-ceivers would mean anything or exist, so he helps out a lot.”

Vanderslice not only works hard at practice, but he also studies plays afterwards to make sure he knows the right calls.

Sports Sept. 25, 2015 4 The Thunderbeat

Vanderslice: not center of attention but center of field “I would say a quality Sam has that not a lot of high school players have is his motor. He goes hard all the time. There’s many plays that are under ap-

preciated as far as the screens and the passes to our receiv-ers,” Moore said. “A lot of times in our games he is down the field 20 to 30 yards trying

to find a block and that’s fair-ly rare when it comes to high school players.” A scrappy, dependable player who communicates well are important qualities to being a center according to Moore. “Sam, from what I see, is definitely a leader by example. He’s fairly vocal but he uses that to motivate or get after his line or teammates when he needs too,” Moore said. “On a daily bases he puts a lot of effort every day for each play, and it separates him from a lot of kids.” Since Vanderslice has been playing as a center for two years now, he feels less pressure than he did last year. Although, he still has some pressure considering his job is important. “It’s great to be a center during the game just cause you feel like you’re in charge of the whole line, and you can help lead your team to a vic-tory,” Vanderslice said. Vanderslice and the rest of the football team takes on cross-town rival Bellevue East tonight at 7 p.m.

Glotfelty chases home run record

Senior Grace Glotfelty is on her way to breaking the current home run record in a high school career. The current record was set by Linzy Heim, who also holds eight other individual soft-ball records. Heim’s record is twelve; Glotfelty needs four to tie, and five to break it. Glotfelty admitted that the possibility of breaking a re-cord will add a little pressure, but remains optimistic of the upcoming season. “I’m not really worried about it,” Glotfelty said. “Whatever happens will hap-pen, and if I’m meant to break it then I guess I will. It’s not that big of a deal.” Glotfelty beat her first in-dividual record in last year’s season with a slugging per-centage of .710, and would not be ashamed if she didn’t break the home run record. Softball coach Laura Kra-tchovil said she plans on keep-

ing Glotfelty as relaxed as she can and let her enjoy her last year of high school ball without getting too tensed up. Kratchovil said she doesn’t have any specific help to give Glotfelty, but explained that the team engaged in a lot of hitting drills and had a summer workout schedule to get stron-ger. “She is such a strong hit-ter already. She can do some damage in terms of getting runs in,” Kratchovil said. Glotfelty is also known to add many dynamics to the team. “Everybody looks up to her,” said sophomore Syd-ney Fogarty. “Everybody re-ally loves being around her because she lifts the team up. She really adds a lot to the team.” Freshman Madison Mach-acek described Glotfelty as a hard worker. Machacek consid-ers Glotfelty as both a friend and a player who is patient when helping her teammates. The team describes them-

selves as having a hard work ethic and does their best to push each other to avoid errors during their season. In addition to playing at Bellevue West, Glotfelty has been playing on the Bellevue Shockers since 12U. The Shockers offers a scholarship for individuals who have played with them for a certain number of years. Even though Glotfelty has this op-portunity, she’s not sure if col-lege softball is something she wants to pursue. “A part of me wants to because I really enjoy play-ing softball, but a part of me doesn’t want to because it’s going to be a big time com-mitment.” Glotfelty’s teammates will support her whatever her deci-sion is. “We are all aware of how great she is, and we believe in her,” said senior Mackenzie Madsen. The softball team will play in the Lincoln Southeast Invite tomorrow.

Cross-country prepares for season with summer training

Bellevue West cross coun-try’s three month season is full of training. They go from long slow runs, to mile repeats, to ultimate football. But their first day of season doesn't begin when the first day of official practice starts. For these run-ners, cross country starts with team bonding and a water

trampoline. “Practices in the summer are relaxing, they’re more of get togethers and bonding time with teammates,” soph-omore Keondra Whisenhunt said. The summer practices start in the beginning of June and go to all the way until the end of July. Summer conditioning objective is so the cross coun-try team can enjoy each other's

company, talking and having fun while building a base for their long distance runs. “My favorite part of sum-mer practices, I’d say, would be spending time in the lake with my friends and talking af-ter the runs,” senior Christian Young said. “That was the fun part, not the actual running.” The cross country team members agree that they be-came closer with each other

during their summer practic-es. This helps out for when it comes time for their fall sea-son. “I got to know a lot of peo-ple out on our runs, because we were spending a lot of time with one another,” Young said. The cross country team would meet up Tuesdays and Thursdays, although that did not stop many from running everyday.

Other runners like No-lan Schneider and Keondra Whisenhunt ran six to seven days a week. “Fall practices are mentally and physically tough. We are always working hard and get-ting better,” Whisenhunt said. “I’m very excited because I think we have a great chance of making it to state and we have some new talent to help boost our team.”

KORTNEY BURESH

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EMILY WILSON

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KORTNEY BURESH

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