“Even off the field we all get along, and that carries onto the field,” said junior Avery DeKoven, who leads the team with 10 goals.

During the trip that also included going to a baseball game and viewing the University of Richmond field hockey team’s practice, players journaled their goals for the season. Some kept their entries to themselves, while others shared them with the team. One that was shared: win districts, something that hasn’t been done at Oakton since 2006, before much of this roster was born.

“All three years — my freshman, sophomore and junior years — we always ended our season at the regional semifinals. I just want to go further than that and make it to states,” senior Esther Eum said. “ … Nothing’s impossible if we really give it our all.”

Lee Ingham has a rule when putting together Good Counsel’s roster at the start of each season. The longtime coach doesn’t cut any athletes after tryouts — a policy she has followed for more than a decade.

The Falcons don’t field freshman or junior varsity teams. Ingham has instead implemented a “practice squad” for young and inexperienced players to learn the basics of the sport, a developmental group that gives every player a place on the team.

“It’s like my internal feeder system,” Ingham said. “It’s pretty cool because I can watch kids just get better and better and come up the next year.”

Sophia Sakkos and Gabby Georges had never played competitive tennis before trying out for the team last season. Ingham placed them both on the practice squad so they could learn the fundamentals of the sport and practice at the same time as the varsity team.

This season, Sakkos and Georges are both varsity team captains.

“During the practice squad we did a lot of basics like forehands and backhands, just learning to play strategically and being able to serve,” Georges said. “But I think one of the biggest things that you have to carry from practice squad to the varsity team is your confidence.”

Good Counsel has a five-member practice squad this season, a group of young players training to make the jump to varsity next season. Those players cheer on the team during home games and attend bonding events — experiences Sakkos believes prepared her for her jump.

“We wanted to be on varsity [this year] so we kept playing by ourselves throughout the year and we came back, tried out and made it, which is awesome,” Sakkos said. “It’s just kind of crazy because we used to not know anything about tennis, and now it’s our favorite sport.”

It wasn’t necessarily a surprise. Other coaches in Northern Virginia had warned that Madison might be a team on the rise.

But to start 8-0, and to do so under a first-year coach, will make even the most lukewarm believers take note. With the season just a few weeks old, Madison’s athletic, defensive-minded brand of volleyball has established the Warhawks as the early favorite in a crowded crop of Class 6 contenders.

“I think our desire to win is a lot higher,” senior Camille Pomeroy said. “We hold each other accountable in a positive way. And everything’s more efficient.”

Coach Kendal Hall, a 2016 Madison graduate, identified promise in the program when she first stepped on campus. Sure, the program looked a little different than when her Warhawks won a state championship in 2015 (with Hall earning a first team All-Met selection that year). But volleyball, and high school, also looked different in 2023, so she didn’t see any reason to worry.

If anything, she saw enough similarities that some early confidence snuck in. When 40 players arrived in Madison’s gym for varsity tryouts — and she began having to cut “great” players — Hall figured Madison might be back in the running. When they responded to their first dropped set of the season with a 3-1 victory, she beamed.

Perhaps the most proud she has felt tis in her players’ care for the program’s short- and long-term future. Several injured varsity players, including junior setter Lauren Garrett, have bounced around to freshman and junior varsity practices without being prodded to facilitate improvement on other rungs of the program. She also heard her players not just vocalize their goals but ask the staff how to get there.

“The big thing our coaching staff noticed with the culture going in was that a lot of players wanted to win districts, wanted to win regions, but they didn’t really know how to do it,” Hall said. “They’re absorbing everything really well. They’re amazing.”

Washington International ended last season one goal away from a dream finish. The Red Devils, representing a small, globally minded private school in Northwest Washington, have had plenty of success over the years in the Potomac Valley Athletic Conference, winning nine of the past 10 league titles. Last fall they took the next step in their postseason mission by making the D.C. State Athletic Association championship.

They fell to undefeated Gonzaga, 1-0, but succeeded in garnering more attention and respect locally. This year, the team wanted a bigger challenge.

“After a really strong season, I had spoken with a couple of the returning players and asked what they wanted for the season ahead. They said they wanted to go against some tougher competition to open the year,” Coach Andrew Sopher said. “They wanted to get a feel for what the standard was going to be.”

Washington International began its season with reigning Washington Catholic Athletic Conference champion Gonzaga and reigning Interstate Athletic Conference co-champ Landon back to back. Even though they lost both matches, the Red Devils hope to carry some of that ambition and momentum into the rest of their schedule.

“We knew we were going into some tough games,” Sopher said. “But our effort hasn’t dropped off at all. It’s just a new group of players that are learning how to play with each other and that takes time over the course of the season.”

The team lost 16 seniors to graduation, and at a school of just 250 students at the high school level, it takes time to replenish the roster. Among the key returners are the team’s three captains: senior defender Antonio Giorgianni, senior midfielder Emilio Pineda and sophomore midfielder Filippo Mancini-Griffoli.

“I’ve always had a great opportunity to work with a community of students, many international, who grew up with soccer as their first sport,” Sopher said. “They grew up with the sport, they understand it so well and their on-field IQ is well-beyond anything I had as a player.”

Good Counsel’s trip to New York started with a weather-shortened 1-0 defeat to Albertus Magnus, the No. 9-ranked team in the nation, after the game Friday was called five minutes into the second half because of lightning.

The Falcons didn’t let the loss get them down. They sang Taylor Swift songs and tunes from Disney movies “Frozen” and “Tangled” on the way to their hotel before they rebounded with a 4-1 win over Immaculate Heart Academy (N.J.) on Saturday.

Coach Jim Bruno was pleased with his team’s performances in both games but even happier to see them come together off the field over the course of the weekend, which culminated with a trip to Six Flags on Sunday.

“This team, pretty much half of the players are all new,” senior captain Paige Kush said. “Coming up here and playing and all the team bonding, it’s really helping us become closer and helping us getting to know each other so much better. It’s just an experience that you can’t replace.”

The Falcons went into New York City to eat at a pizzeria and watch a showing of “The Lion King” on Broadway after Saturday morning’s victory. Bruno said Good Counsel attempts to make a weekend trip each year to cultivate team chemistry and prepare the team for a tough WCAC schedule with matchups against top teams from other states.

“We got a situation where I can bring them together to do some team bonding here, besides obviously playing some tough competition,” Bruno said. “So there’s a lot more to it than just going out there and playing soccer.”

Players from five Anne Arundel County schools met at the Preserve at Eisenhower golf course on Tuesday for the region’s second all-girls match of the season.

Started by Severna Park Coach Pete Buck this year, the matches mark a first for high school golf in the county, though planning was started by former Arundel coach Phelps Prescott six years ago.

“[This] actually would have come to fruition three years ago, but then covid hit, it kind of delayed us,” Buck said. Once … we got back on the golf course, Phelps continued to push girls-only matches, and we’ve promoted it so well that we have six high schools that have at least four girls.”

Because many girls playing do not typically get a chance to start, the matches provide players an opportunity for many new experiences.

“With the girls’ open [matches], you’re with the same girls every single time,” said Severna Park junior Leah Salkeld. “So it’s giving us a chance to meet someone new and giving us a chance to get competitive.”

Golf at the high school level in Maryland remains one of the few sports to be fully co-ed for public schools in all matches and tournaments. Crofton Coach Collin Snyder hopes more matches like these and further awareness for the sport will help to level the playing field.

“I’d like to see [girls’ golf] kind of where track is, where they have their own state tournament, they have their own state champions and they have their own records,” he said. “They deserve just as much as the boys do.”

The D.C. area endured extreme heat last week, as numerous towns in Maryland broke temperature records. It was not conducive to distance running.

Multiple programs — including Churchill, Dominion and Springbrook — had meets postponed or canceled Wednesday. Some districts have guidelines to ensure the meets are not run; other coaches mutually made the decision.

For schools that were able to get meets in during the weekend, performances were compromised by the heat.

At the Chesapeake Invitational on Saturday, a junior varsity runner suffered from heat exhaustion and was taken to a hospital, Chesapeake Coach Joe Hatcher said.

A different runner, on his own team, couldn’t finish what was shaping up to be a strong performance.

“She had to stop because she couldn’t breathe,” Hatcher said. “She was way up in the standings, and of course I wanted to see her go, but then again my first concern is their safety.”