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By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Sixteen Shawnee County players have received All-State recognition from the Kansas Softball Coaches Association.
Undefeated Class 6A state champion Topeka High put four players on All-Class 6A first team while state quarterfinalist Washburn Rural had two first-team picks.
Topeka High junior NiJaree Canady was one of four Trojans named to the All-Class 6A first team by the Kansas Softball Coaches Association after High went 25-0 and won the 6A state title. [File photo/TSN]
Washburn Rural senior Olivia Bruno earned a spot on the All-Class 6A All-State softball team after helping lead the Junior Blues to a 6A state tournament berth. [File photo/TSN]
The 25-0 Trojans are represented by junior pitcher NiJaree Canady, senior catcher Zoe Caryl, freshman infielder Adisyn Caryl and senior outfielder Mia Kelly while Washburn Rural is represented by senior pitcher Olivia Bruno and sophomore utility/designated player Emmerson Cope.
Seaman senior Raigan Kramer has been named to the All-Class 5A all-state softball first team. [File photo/TSN]
Silver Lake senior Ellington Hogle (15) has been named to the All-Class 3A softball first team after helping lead the Eagles to a second-place finish in the 3A state tournament. [File photo/TSN]
Seaman senior infielder Raigan Kramer was a first-team All-5A pick while Silver Lake senior infielder Ellington Hogle, who helped lead the Eagles to a runner-up state finish, received first-team honors in 3A.
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By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
It’s always hard for a high school coach to decide when to retire, due in part to the fact that there's always student-athletes coming up that want and need good coaching
“If you’re going to evaluate just on the kids, there’s never a good time to retire because there’s always great kids,’’ said longtime Washburn Rural hurdles/sprints coach Doug Stanley. “There’s always great kids coming up and in three more years there would be another great kid.’’
But although Stanley knows he’ll miss being around a sport he loves, he was able to walk away with one of the highlights of his career as well as a unique accomplishment.
The 59-year-old Stanley had coached Stephanie Reed (now Bush) to a state hurdles title in his first season as a Junior Blues assistant and he ended his long tenure the same way, with Rural senior Marquel Russell, who had been mentored by Stanley throughout his high school career, capturing the Class 6A state title in the boys 110-meter hurdles.
Longtime Washburn Rural assistant track coach Doug Stanley (middle) with his first state hurdles champ, Stephanie (Reed) Bush, and his 2021 state champ, Marquel Russell, at the state track meet in Wichita. [Submitted]
The fact that Bush, who now is the head coach and coaches hurdlers at Eisenhower High School, and Russell were both able to share the moment with Stanley was an added bonus.
“I saw her at regionals, but I didn’t say anything to her at regionals (about retiring),'' said Stanley, who retired from coaching and as a middle school science teacher at the end of the 2020-21 school year. "But when I saw her at state I told her I was retiring.
"Stephanie was my first state champ my very first year and I was a Rule 10 coach, so that was like 35 years ago and here we are again this year. That’s cool.’’
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Washburn men's basketball coach Brett Ballard talks to campers at the end of Wednesday's morning session at Lee Arena. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
Kansas freshman guard Bobby Pettiford signs an autograph for a camper at Wednesday's Washburn Basketball Camp at Lee Arena. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
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By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
All 10 Shawnee County high schools have nominted multiple senior athletes for the 16th annual Topeka Shawnee County High School Sports Awards, which will be presented on June 30 at the Capitol Plaza Hotel's Maner Conference Center Sunflower Ballroom.
TopSports.news, in conjunction with Envista Credit Union and A-1 Lock and Key, will present awards to top female and male athletes in the fall, winter and spring seasons, as well as overall female and male athletes of the year and the most inspirational female and male. A complete of nominees is listed below.
Topeka High's Zoe Caryl (right), who helped lead the Trojans to the Class 6A state softball title, is a nominee for the 2021 Topeka Shawnee County High School Sports Awards, which will be presented on June 30. [File photo/TSN]
Rossville's Alex Sherer, who captured the Class 3A-1A state singles tennis title, is a nominee for the 2021Topeka Shawnee County Sports Awards. [File photo/TSN]
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Washburn Rural state track champion Marquel Russell (middle) with his parents, Shanna Bigler, and Jason Russell, who adopted Marquel when he was 3 years old. [Photo by Rick Peterson/TSN]
By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
On May 27 in Wichita, recent Washburn Rural graduate Marquel Russell put on a show for the Cessna Stadium crowd, posting an impressive 14.79-second win in the 110-meter hurdles to capture a coveted Class 6A state championship.
It was a huge moment, not only for Russell and his family but for the Washburn Rural and special needs communities as a whole, with the 10 hurdles Russell sailed over that day the latest among the hundreds if not thousands of hurdles he has faced and cleared since the day he was born.
"We got Marquel when he was three and he had been through the foster care system and had a lot of significant trauma,'' said Shanna Bigler, Russell's adopted mother. "He was also born with agenesis of corpus callosum, which means that the right and left hemispheres of his brain don't connect. So everything that comes in, all the processing that comes into his brain has to do both sides and it takes more work for him to process and understand things. Marquel didn't talk until he was three and he's really come through a lot. He's at about a third-grade reading level, but people just wouldn't guess that's how he is.
"We took him for another brain scan at KU a couple of years ago and they said, 'Honestly, we don't know how he's able to do the things he's able to do, but we're not going to put any athletic restrictions on him. Let him be as great as he can be and wants to be.' We were really excited about that because prior to that they had been really concerned about him hitting his head and creating more issues, so we were really proud that not only was he able to play general education athletics, but he surpassed his own expectations.''
Russell's state championship marked his third state medal in the 110-meter hurdles in as many tries, following a second-place finish as a freshman and a fourth-place finish as a sophomore.
"It felt great,'' Russell said of the state title. "I still can't believe I did that.''
"It was a miracle,'' said Jason Russell, Marquel's adopted father. "The chief of neurology told us, 'This kid shouldn't even be able to walk.' It's just amazing.''
Bigler agreed.
"Everybody that was with us for state, we were all standing up there crying because he wasn't supposed to be able to do this.''
