By Matt CarstensIssaquah Press reporter

If there’s one single word in the English language to describe a strategy in high school track, it might be survival.

Staying healthy is the name of the game. Skyline High School coaches Dawn Geiser and Marc Hillestad agree that if you keep your best athletes healthy you have a real good chance when the post-season rolls around.

“My philosophy at this point is the team that does well post-sea-son is the team that keeps their kids healthy,” Geiser said. “And that’s always been my philosophy as a coach. I’m going to under-train my kids versus overtrain them, because you can have someone running really well right now but if they’re not healthy at the end of the season it’s not go-ing to help you.”

Her counterpart Hillestad agrees.

“Dawn and I are on board with the same deal,” he said. “I think one of the biggest changes has been with our distance program so they’re not over-racing but their ready to race when the meet comes. It’s a philosophical change but our distance coach has done a great job getting those kids to buy in.”

Fast tracking the youthFor Skyline, there are a lot of

fresh faces in the mix when it comes to track and field, and with the loss of superstar Kasen Wil-liams, there are big holes to fill.

“On the boys’ side, we have a lot of rookies,” Hillestad said. “We have a lot of first timers. We’re trying to figure that out, get them acclimated. We also have three new coaches on staff, so that’s been a big change but a positive change all around. Our distance coach is doing a wonderful job, and we’ve got some strong perfor-mances coming from them.”

Hillestad said he is excited about the school’s distance program and thinks the team could have several boys under the 4:30 mark in the mile, as well as several under 10 minutes in the 2-mile run. Some of those names include Keegan Symmes, Drew Matthews and Riley Herrera.

On the girls’ side, Geiser said she thinks the season is going well so far.

“We’re excited about a couple of the invites we have coming up,” she said. “We had some great performances at our dual meet with Newport. A couple of the girls won their individual events and posted some really good early season times. I’m really excited about that.”

Many of the key contributors are some of the youngest on the team.

“Some of the girls that are post-ing the early times right now are our youth,” Geiser said. “I also have a freshman that has come in and is doing a really nice job in the sprints and hurdles.”

That freshman goes by the name of Geneva Ecola and she came in first place with a score of 18.5 in the 100-meter hurdles

against Ballard on April 5.Although her youth is impress-

ing people early, Geiser said she believes that track coaches have it a little tougher than some of the other sports’ coaches.

“You look at the high school soccer, baseball and basketball, all those sports have clubs so the kids come in with all these skills, and we don’t have that in track,” she said. “As track coaches, we really do have to coach. Some of the other sports those kids have had avid coaching since they were young, and we don’t have select track clubs and things like that.”

Instilling a winning wayLiberty High School’s depth

with its entire team has allowed it to win quite a few meets this season, even though according to coach Mike Smith, the regular season meets mean very little in the big picture.

“The dual meets during the season don’t do anything, they’re just for fun,” Smith said.

Because of the way the KingCo meet is set up, it is a much more individual sport. The top 16 make

it to the post-season, whether that mark is met at the beginning or end of the season.

“You have kids like Josh Gor-don who will qualify for eight or nine events, and it’ll just be a matter of which four is he going to pick,” Smith said. “The com-petition during the season is kind of an odd thing. Because it’s like if you’re a basketball team, the regular season record is kind of fun, and it’s important for every-body to be happy, but the post-season tournament is the only thing that matters. It makes it so some teams don’t care about the dual meets.

“We like doing well because we have enough bodies to do well. We like to win them. We usually try a little harder than some of the other teams.”

Smith said his team is set up very nicely with Gordon and others to make a good run in the post-season. Of course, health is always a key factor.

“Always the hard thing with us is we have some really, really, really good individuals,” Smith said. “And that’s what you need

at state. State isn’t really a team sport, it’s more of an individual sport, and you have to have the superstars.

“Depending on whether we stay healthy, and you can’t lose even one of the guys that did well at state last year, we could be in the top 3 again,” he added. “It’s all based on staying healthy and not anything going wrong. We had a perfect meet last year. Can we do it twice? I don’t know.”

Personal recordsThe theme of Issaquah High

School track this year seems to be personal records, as multiple records have been set each week.

At last week’s dual meet versus Bothell, the girls won, 107-47, while the boys came up short, 100-44. Among the personal records set were Emilie James in

SPORTSs s

The Issaquah Press

�Wednesday, April 11, 2012Page B4

B4

By Mason KelleySeattle Times staff reporter

SAMMAMISH — Not long after Max Browne’s plane touched down in Los Angeles, the Sky-line High School quarterback was sitting down to lunch at Lemonade, a USC hot spot, with Trojans quarterback Matt Barkley.

Browne, the nation’s top-rated

prep passer according to both Rivals.com and Scout.com, admit-ted he was “kind of nervous,” but the latest in a long line of USC All-American quarterbacks quickly put him at ease.

“Matt Barkley is a guy you see on ESPN very consistently,” said Browne, who ordered a chicken sandwich Barkley recommended. “That’s one of the biggest things you find with the guys at USC — they’re just real guys. I sat down for an hourlong lunch with Matt Barkley and it was an easy con-versation.”

After three days in Southern California, Browne decided he was ready to tell friends and teammates he would play foot-ball for the Trojans. He made the announcement the night of

April 4 at Skyline.“USC came into the picture

several months ago and, ever since then, they really went after me hard,” Browne said. “As a quarterback growing up on the West Coast, at least for me personally, there was always the dream of growing up and being the quarterback for the Trojans.”

Browne sat with Skyline coach Mat Taylor at a table in the school gym for the announce-ment. After thanking his fam-ily, coaches and teammates, Browne turned around, pulled a hat out of a bag and slipped off his sweatshirt. When he turned back to face the crowd, he was wearing a black T-shirt and hat, featuring the crimson-and-gold

USC logo.“The coaches said when I was

down there, ‘Max, it’s one thing to have great players, but our best players are our best guys. That goes for Robert Woods, Marq-ise Lee, Matt Barkley, all those guys,’” Browne said. “It’s just a special place to be.”

The 6-foot-5, 210-pound junior picked the Trojans over Oklahoma, Washington and Alabama.

“When Peyton Manning was making his decision (to go to the Denver Broncos), he said ‘I saw a lot of great teams, but I can’t play for them all. I’m going to make the right decision for me.’ Max was similar,” Browne’s father Mike said. “There were a lot of great programs. He could not

make a wrong decision.”After landing Lakes lineman

Zach Banner just before signing day in January, USC reeled in the state’s top recruit in the 2013 class.

“He’s very, very special,” Taylor said. “He’s got everything you want. He’s got the size. He’s got the mind. He’s got the football IQ, his leadership ability. The sky is truly the limit.”

Barkley is entering his senior season and the Trojans didn’t sign a quarterback in 2012, so Browne fills a position of need. Like Bar-kley, who won the starting job as a freshman, Browne is working toward graduating early so he can

Skyline quarterback Max Browne passes on Dawgs for USC

Nearly 50 personal watercraft enthusiasts hit the 45-degree water of Lake Sammamish in a search of the lake for Easter eggs on April 8.

“I can’t feel my toes,” Danya Simpson, of Ocean Shores, said after returning to shore with three eggs in hand at the conclusion of the third annual On-Water Easter Egg Hunt Fundraiser.

The event began at 10 a.m., with personal watercraft riders departing from the Lake Sam-mamish State Park boat launch area.

Northwest Freeride owner Dayton Fedak, of Issaquah, “hid” approximately 80 prize eggs on

PHOTOS BY GREG FARRAR

Joey Domek, Issaquah High School junior, leaps a barrier as he wins the 110-meter hurdles in a time of 17.54 sec-onds April 5 against Bothell. Domek also persevered in the 300 hurdles with a time of 44.4 seconds.

Max BrowneSee BROWNE, Page B5

Nation’s top prep passer dreamed of throwing for

the Trojans

BY GREG FARRAR

Mowin’ them down

Brandon Mahovlich, Issaquah High School senior pitcher, throws as Garfield batters go three up and three down dur-ing the third inning of their April 4 baseball game. Mahov-

lich’s sacrifice RBI scoring teammate Blake Miller in the first inning, plus his complete-game pitching, contributed to the

Eagles’ 1-0 win.

Water enthusiasts take egg hunt to new depths

BY ROGER HARNACK/NORTHWEST JET SPORTS ASSOCIATION

Jet Skiers pose after returning to the Lake Sammamish State Park boat launch area, Easter eggs in hand, to collect their prizes.

See EGG HUNT, Page B5

Track teams evaluate mid-season progress

Mckenna Hogan, Issaquah High School junior, takes the baton for the anchor leg from senior Madison Callan during the 4X200 meter relay race. Including Juliana da Cruz and Gabrielle Gevers, the team won in 1 minute, 45.7 seconds April 5 against Bothell.

See TRACK, Page B5

Eva Perry, Issaquah High School senior, powers herself up and over the bar to clear 10 feet, 6 inches on the way to her 11-foot women’s pole vault victory April 5 against Bothell.