Addison Trail student-athletes represent Blazer Pride during fall sports season

Pictured is Addison Trail Athletic Director Matt Thompson.

It was a tremendous fall sports season at Addison Trail, and the student-athletes certainly continued the Blazer Pride that is Addison Trail Athletics!

Below is a recap with highlights.

Football
The Blazer Football Team finished its 2019 campaign at 3-6 on the season and 3-3 in Conference. The season was filled with ups and downs, but the team competed weekly. Two late-season victories highlighted the year. Eight seniors were named to the All-Academic Team (Sulaeman Ahmed, Yusuf Farooqui, Manny Hernandez, Elliot Jasso, Salvatore Napoli, Gonzalo Reyes, Jacub Trippiedi and Anthony Valenti). Six players earned All-Conference honors (Valenti, Napoli, Reyes, senior Anthony Carlson, sophomore Nathaniel Figueroa and junior Eric Reed).

Boys Golf
The Boys Golf Team was led by senior golfer James Cerven, who had an average score of 41. Sophomores AJ Scali and Elijah Aquino, junior Peter Markopoulos, senior Aidan O’Donnell and freshman Frank Barges had averages around 49 and contributed to team wins. Freshman Philip Sitkowski, freshman Jack Bolsinger and sophomore Patrick Lacni are three of the many underclassmen who will be counted on next year to step up. Aquino advanced to the Sectional tournament. Cerven earned All-Conference honors and advanced to the Sectional tournament. Cerven and O’Donnell also made the All-Academic Team.

Girls Golf
The Girls Golf Team had three returning seniors, who had an eventful season. Victoria Toay and Mikaela Olvera fought the whole year for the top spot, with Toay edging Olvera out in the last tournament. The girls also had five freshmen and a sophomore join the team for the first time. They were very new to golf and improved tremendously throughout the season. The team tried not to focus on wins and losses, but on seeing improvement in scores.

Girls Tennis
The Girls Tennis Team finished 6-9 for the season. The 3rd doubles team of sophomore Sara Bojczuk and junior Nadiah Reyes earned All-Conference honors by placing 3rd in the Conference tournament. The highlight of the season was when the Blazers finished in 1st place in the Addison Trail Quad. They won 11 of their 12 matches that day and finished with three 1st-place medals and one 2nd-place medal. The next closest team was six wins away from Addison Trail. The girls are already looking forward to next season, as nine of the starting 11 players will be back!

Boys Soccer
The Boys Soccer Team finished the season with a 13-5-3 record. The Blazers finished in 2nd place in Conference, with a 5-1 record. The Blazers are bringing back 11 of the 19 players from this year’s varsity team next season. Addison Trail was ranked in the Daily Herald Top 20 all season. The team finished ranked No. 25 overall in Illinois. The boys finished 3rd out of eight teams in the Joe Novy Tournament at the beginning of the season and lost in penalty kicks in the semifinals of the PepsiCo Showdown tournament. The team also lost 2-1 in the playoffs to St. Charles North in a well-played game by both sides. With having so many new members to varsity, this was a great learning experience for these players, who will be back next year. All-Conference players were senior Leonardo Acosta, senior Martin Murillo, senior Ernesto Padua, junior Ray Fischer, junior Anthony Hernandez and junior Aaron Sanchez. Hernandez was named Honorable Mention All-Sectional and also made the Daily Herald All-Area First Team. Acosta was named All-Sectional and Daily Herald All-Area First Team. He also has signed a letter of commitment to play soccer at Aurora University. Murillo has signed a letter of commitment to play at Purdue University Northwest.

A highlight of this season was when Addison Trail won the Charity Bracket of the PepsiCo Showdown tournament by beating Dundee-Crown and Wheaton Academy ($200 was donated to TOPSoccer, a community-based training and team placement program for young athletes with disabilities, where Addison Trail players volunteer their time). The Sophomore Team went undefeated in Conference play and won the eight-team Joe Novy Tournament, so the future is bright for Addison Trail soccer.

Girls Volleyball
The 2019 Blazers left their mark as one of the best teams in program history. The girls finished with a 23-14 record and earned 2nd place in Conference. The team’s regular season success was rewarded with a No. 5 seed in the playoff Sectional. The Blazers advanced to the Regional championship match and dropped a heartbreaker to rival Downers Grove South in a dramatic finish, with a 26-28 loss. That was the closest the Blazers have come to winning a Regional championship since 1998. Tournament highlights included a 2nd-place finish at the Willowbrook Tournament and a 6th-place finish at the prestigious Main West Pumpkin Invite. Four-year starter Jessica D’Ambrose, a senior, was selected to the All-Area DuPage County First Team by the Daily Herald for the second year in a row. D’Ambrose, junior Ally Severino and senior Amy Reyes also earned All-Conference honors. While the team will certainly lose a talented senior class to graduation, the future is bright. Three starters will return for the 2020 season, and the team will welcome a talented sophomore group (which finished with a 25-5 record) to the varsity level.

Boys Cross-Country
The Boys Cross-Country Team had a tremendously successful fall season! The team had a solid group of sophomores and juniors, who carried much of the weight during the season – especially with the weather adjustments and meets canceled or altered due to heavy rains in late September and early October. Sophomore Max Ojeda was an All-Conference honoree, with a 15th-place finish in the sophomore race. On varsity, the team had an All-Conference athlete in junior Dylan Moran, who finished in 3rd place at Conference. Collectively, the varsity boys were only 12 points out of 3rd place – a great effort for the squad. As the boys moved to Regionals, they were fortunate enough to have two individuals qualify to the Sectional meet (Moran and sophomore Alex Martinez). In the third mud fest of the year, Martinez ran extremely well, and Moran qualified for the State meet – the first Blazer runner to do so in more than 30 years! He capped off his season in Peoria by setting the new school record in the 3-mile run.

Girls Cross-Country
The Girls Cross-Country Team had a very successful season. The team had 30 girls participate this year. The group earned medals and ribbons at the Fenton Early Bird Invitational, the Peoria First to the Finish Invite and the St. Charles North Star Invite. Lead runner Viviana Sanfilippo, a junior, won each of the Conference dual meets this season. The team also had two All-Conference athletes, Sanfilippo (8th place) and sophomore Madelyn Ford (11th place). A large group of freshmen runners joined the team this year, including Esmeralda Bucio, Vanessa Montes and Genesis Santacruz, and all three were selected to run on the Regional Team. Sanfilippo and Ford qualified to the Sectional meet, and the team capped off the season with Sanfilippo being the first-ever girls cross-country State qualifier in school history. She had a strong showing at the State meet, running a personal record time of 18:20 in the 3-mile run, narrowly missing the school record by two seconds. It was a great season, and the future continues to look bright for girls cross-country in 2020.

We look forward to more athletic successes during the winter and spring seasons. Go, Blazers!

* Addison Trail is part of the West Suburban Conference Gold Division.