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JULY 31-AUG. 6, 2019

In Your Honor Berlin’s Sophia Hernandez lost both of her grandparents in the last seven months. She’ll play in their memory for Puerto Rico at the Women’s Lacrosse World Championship this week.

By RYAN LAWRENCE Sports Editor

During the wintertime in the 1970s, baseball thrived on the island, giving Jose Hernandez an excuse to tell his young sons about Roberto Clemente and Orlando Cepeda. Major league baseball players — including those who called the island

home — would flock to Puerto Rico before spring training to keep their skills sharp in the offseason.

Jose and Alec Hernandez would watch, listen to their father, and hope to one day make it as ballplayers and proudly represent their homeland, like Roberto Alomar, Carlos Beltran or “Pudge” Rodriguez.

“The opportunity to represent the dreams of so many kids who would love to represent Puerto Rico,” the younger Jose Hernandez said, “that’s a big deal.”

It’s why Hernandez, who moved with his family from Puerto Rico to South Jersey in 1980, was beaming with pride when he boarded a plane at New York City’s JFK Airport this spring. Walking in front of him, wearing a Puerto Rican Lacrosse jersey, was his 18-yearold daughter, Sophia. “‘We have a team?!?’” Jose Hernandez recalled a few seated passengers asking as father and daughter walked up the aisle.

“They were really excited. So I think a lot of Puerto Ricans are going to be super excited to be represented (on the world stage).”

Beginning Friday, Sophia Hernandez will take the field for her father’s native land at

RYAN LAWRENCE, South Jersey Sports Weekly

Berlin’s Sophia Hernandez lost both of her paternal grandparents in the last seven months.

She’ll play in their memory, and make history in the process, as a member of Team Puerto Rico at the Women’s Lacrosse 2019 U19 World Championship in Peterborough, Canada, in the next two weeks. the Women’s Lacrosse 2019 U19 World Championship in Peterborough, Canada. Hernandez, who graduated from Eastern Regional High School last month, will suit up for Puerto Rico’s history-making national

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lacrosse team.

The international tournament will mark the first time Puerto Rico has competed in women’s lacrosse. Like Sophia Hernandez, the vast majority of the team is comprised of heri-

tage players: women with parents or grandparents born in Puerto Rico.

“It’s been probably the greatest experience I’ve had,” Hernandez said. “Playing in high please see SOPHIA, page 4

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SOUTH JERSEY SPORTS WEEKLY — JULY 31-AUG. 6, 2019

ROWING

No motley crew

RYAN LAWRENCE, South Jersey Sports Weekly

Pat O’Connell of Marlton, Aidan Kilgannon of Collingswood, Connor Thompson of Mount Laurel, Quinn Sullivan of Haddonfield and Colin Rosser of Moorestown were all members of the St. Joseph’s Prep Varsity 8 boat that advanced to the quarterfinals at the prestigious Henley Royal Regatta in England earlier this month.

St. Joe’s Prep’s South Jersey-fueled Varsity 8 is making waves at home and on the international stage, too

By RYAN LAWRENCE Sports Editor

The path to the Henley Royal Regatta, self-described as “undoubtedly the best known regatta in the world,” culminated with a seven-hour international flight over the Atlantic Ocean to River Thames in Oxfordshire, England, earlier this month.

But it began in the basement of a prep school in North Philly.

It was there, in the bowels of St. Joseph’s Preparatory School, that a group of nearly seven dozen, strong-willed teenagers sweated away their winter.

There probably wasn’t anyone in the room who would define it as fun, but they trusted

their coach and each other that it was the necessary work to achieve success, sacrificing sleep and social activities for a common goal.

“These guys are quite talented and gifted athletes, but talent and gifts mean nothing if you’re not willing to push yourself hard enough to use them,” said Berlin native John Fife, a Prep graduate who just finished his second season coaching the crew team at his alma mater.

“These guys push their limits every day. … No shortcuts, keeping each other accountable, and simple hard work.”

To say the work paid off would be a gross understatement. The Prep won the Philadelphia Catholic League Cham-

pionship for the 40th time in program history and its Varsity 8, Lightweight 8, JV 8, Freshman 8 and Novice 8 were all victorious at the Philadelphia City Championship.

And that was before they took their talents on the national and international stages.

The Lightweight 8 won the Scholastic National Championship and, two months ago in Philly, the Varsity 8, Lightweight 8, and Freshman 8 won at the Stotesbury Cup Regatta, the largest high school regatta in the world.

For the nine athletes on the Varsity 8, the crowning achievement of their season came on Independence Day. On the second day of competition at the Henley Royal Regatta in the English town of Henley-onThames, Prep collected its second win in as many days when it battled back to beat a team from Germany.

Comprised of just one senior, the Prep Varsity 8 that advanced to the quarterfinals of the Princess Elizabeth Challenge Cup at Henley expects even bigger things in the coming year. Five of the nine members of the 2019 team hail from South Jersey: Pat O’Connell (Marlton), Aidan Kilgannon (Collingswood), Connor Thompson (Mount Laurel), Quinn Sullivan (Haddonfield) and Colin Rosser (Moorestown).

Besides Thompson, the coxswain who is currently scheduled to begin college at West Virginia University later this summer, the rest of the boat will be back for 2020.

“That’s the best part,” said Rosser, a rising senior. “The hard work starts now. … We won Stotesbury in May for the first time since 2010, then we went to Henley for the first time since 2011. Our standards are high now and (our expectations are) even higher now that we’ll no longer have any sophomores on the boat. It’s not going to be the same exact boat, but knowing that we’ll be even faster, it’s really exciting.”

Before getting started on realizing those goals for 2020, Prep’s Varsity 8 has one more international event to test itself before a three-week break in August prior to the start of the school year. The team is set to compete next week at the Royal Canadian Henley Regatta in St. Catharines, a town that sits along Lake Ontario in Canada, just north of Niagara Falls.

For a young team that blossomed earlier than some expected, Prep is eager for more success and enjoying the ride, wherever it takes them next.

“We just came together really well and were able to put together a really uncommon kind of teamwork that you don’t find in every boat,” said O’Connell, a rising junior.

“All nine of us understood the effort we needed to put in in order to win races,” Rosser said.

“Throughout the grueling four months of winter training in the basement of the Prep, I gained a lot of trust in the other guys on the team, and that trust in each other is what allowed us to do what we did this year.” ■

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JULY 31-AUG. 6, 2019 – SOUTH JERSEY SPORTS WEEKLY

Haddon Glen’s Jolie Carpino prepares on the board.

Fox Hollow’s Gabi Valladares gets plenty of air under her jump before heading toward the water.

Haddon Glen’s Aidan Van Istendal goes airborne off the board.

Wedgewood’s Kate Hoover shows off her form.

Tavistock’s Kelsie Waddington gets set to hit the surface.

All Photos: RYAN LAWRENCE/South Jersey Sports Weekly

The South Jersey Diving Association held its 1-meter Championships at Haddon Glen Swim Club in Haddon Heights on Thursday, July 25. ■ Danielle Kerr of Old Orchard gets set.

The seniors who competed in the meet posed on the board after the event. From left: Naomi Amadoro, Demi Poulathas, Alexa Rosenberger, Josh Snyder, Timmy Kuhn, Liv Dougherty, Garrett Kerr and Gabi Valladares.

Wedgewood’s Maggie Morris gets set to launch.

Griffin Ellis of Erlton concentrates on his form.

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Old Orchard’s Garrett Kerr prepares for impact.

James Bygott of Haddon Glen going parallel with the pool.

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SOUTH JERSEY SPORTS WEEKLY — JULY 31-AUG. 6, 2019

SOPHIA

continued from page 1 school and on a club team, I’m the only one. To go there and listen to all of the (other players) say, ‘I’m the only one at my school. And I’m the only one at my school or my club.’ I think that’s the best part. I’ve finally found people who are similar to who I am.

“Even in high school, there aren’t a lot of Hispanics at Eastern. So to be able to interact with people (of the same background) it’s the best feeling, knowing I’m not the only one.

So that makes me even more excited, they all have that same fire. We’re going to do this.”

The confidence is not unfounded. Hernandez said Puerto Rico only first fielded a men’s team for an international tournament last summer and finished in eighth place at the World Games.

But for Hernandez, the experience goes beyond making history. She’s also thrilled to be able to take the opportunity to give back to Puerto Rico — she’s taken part in clinics to help introduce the sport to a country where it isn’t regularly played — and she’s honored to play in memory of Jose and Zenaida Hernandez.

When Sophia Hernandez was in Puerto Rico to help teach at a clinic in December, her grandfather, who was back in his homeland helping with Hurricane Maria damage, was in the hospital. He died before Christmas.

Five months later, Zenaida Hernandez — his widow, Jose’s mom, and Sophia’s grandmother — passed away on Mother’s Day. “She had just passed when I got (to Puerto Rico) for the final tryout,” Sophia Hernandez said.

“So that was the drive. They knew about this whole thing.

To me, that was the most important part of it, that pushed me to do the best that I could, that this was for them.”

The younger Jose Hernandez, a lawyer based in Cherry Hill, put in two weeks of vacation time for the 11-day tournament and traveled to Canada this weekend with his wife and son. He’s proud of his daughter and knows his parents would

be, too.

“Let me tell you, unbelievably proud,” he said. “I remember my dad taking me to see major league players in Winter ball. ... The fact that she’s going to represent Puerto Rico is just incredible. I still can’t believe it.

It’s an amazing opportunity.”

The World Championship will help Hernandez extend her playing career.

Beset with back injuries in high school, Hernandez gave up her Division-I dreams a while ago and focused instead on continuing her education at a prestigious academic environment. She’ll study behavioral neuroscience at Northeastern University in Boston beginning this fall.

A student-athlete who excels both on the field and in the classroom, Hernandez is just as honored to serve her family’s home island as she is to play her favorite sport on an international stage.

“I think the most important part is that we give back to the island,” she said. “After the storm, a lot happened and I know my family was affected by it greatly. To be able to go back and do little service projects. ... I’ve been twice, I’ve done a clinic for young kids where we were able to donate, in partnership with U.S. lacrosse, over 100 sticks and equipment to a local sports camp on the island.

There’s a guy that teaches them to play all different sports, keeps them occupied all afternoon and feeds them lunch and breakfast.

That was the one project.

“The first I got involved with was the Pan-American Sports Conference in San Juan in December. It was an instructional clinic for over 600 college professors, high school teachers, elementary school teachers and even kids studying to be gym teachers, to teach them about the sport. There was a lot of buzz around that because there isn’t any lacrosse on the island.

Everyone is running around with sticks in their hands and people are looking at it saying, ‘What is this?’” … It’s more than going out and playing lacrosse; it’s mostly about giving back. The lacrosse is the bonus on top of this.” ■