In a jam-packed lunchtime ceremony, fourteen Los Alamitos Griffin athletes signed letters of intent to play college sports next year.
The signing ceremony took place on Wednesday in the 500 Room, which was decorated by ASB with posters featuring the athletes’ names and university of choice.
Combined with the 12 signings at the November ceremony, Los Al now has 26 athletes who have signed letters of intent. One more signing date will be held in April. Last year, 55 Los Al athletes signed to play college sports.Technically, most of them signed the day before but the ceremony was pushed back a day because school administrators were unable to attend a ceremony on Wednesday, but the delay didn’t deflate the well-choreographed moment for players, families or friends.
Girls soccer led the way with six players signing LOIs,:
- Lindsey Salcido – Nevada Reno
- Callie Taylor – Cincinnati
- Dominique Banks – Boise State
- Nikki Pokipala – Tulsa
- Natalie Donaldson – Auburn
- Taylor Vargo – Pepperdine
The latter two were unable to play this year for the Griffins who are currently tied atop the Sunset League this year.
Four football players signed committments yesterday.
- Terrance Brown – Northwestern
- Dylan Lagarde – Bryant (Rhose Island)
- Kyle Roberts – Sacramento State
- Cody Paul – Chadron State, (Nebraska)
Other signees:
- Connor Campbell, Golf, Loyola Marymount
- Halley Humphrey, Softball, Indiana State
- Corri Hunt, Volleyball, University of Central Arkansas
- Aya Takahara, Crew, UC San Diego
Aya Takahara, signed for crew, a sport that is not officially offered at Los Alamitos, but students usually compete through Lo0ng Beach Junior Crew. Over the past five years nine Griffins have earned college scholarships through crew.
In explaining why she chose Indiana State to play softball, Halley Humphrey, noted “I chose Indiana State to be really, really, really, far from California.” She won’t be that far away as the school’s athletic director is former Los Al resident Ron Prettyman, whose wife Carol was a longtime music teacher in the district.
The signing ceremony has come a long way since 1999 when John Barnes invited Local Sports to take a photo when he had an unprecedented seven Griffin football players signing LOIs. There were no parents in the room which was a small conference room in the administration building. The players were Ryan Hanson (UNLV), Keenan Howry (Oregon), Bernard Riley (USC), Brandon Cheri (Montana), Stephan Merriweather (Nevada-Reno), Sagan Atuatasi (San Diego State). That same day one Griffin female athlete committed (Bridgett Merritt, University of San Diego volleyball), although soccer players Kristi Bissonnette and Susan Palmer had also committed to play soccer at Pepperdine.
The ceremony really took off at Los Al in 2004 when Debbie Fleming took over as the girls athletic director and wanted to make sure the Los Al girls got the attention they deserved. Not only did Fleming coach a number of quality tennis players and swimmers over the years, but the Los Al soccer and softball teams were a factory producing Division I athletes in those days. In 2005 six members of the CIF champion soccer team (Hayley Bolt, Rocky Hearst, Erin Bay, Jennifer Bakken, Jamie Alvis, Julie Megorden) signed Division I Letters of Intent. That same championship team would ultimately produce 16 Division I athletes : 2006: Sophia (Bo) Medina, Dana Meisner, Megan Strawther, and Mandy Trojan; 2007-Casey Bay, Lauren Bennett, Taylor Cole, and Tori Rocke; and 2008-Katie Suits, Greer Wilk. The 2005 softball team had Stacey Nelson, Brook Ruiz, Brittany Murphy, and Jessica DeMatteo.
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