Berkeley Athletic Fund » 2024 Spring Season Update

We reached a new record in Berkeley High Athletics this year – 1406 student athletes participated on an athletic team representing Berkeley High on the field, court, pool, track and mat. This Spring, teams competed in Badminton, Baseball, Boys & Girls Crew, Boys Golf, Boys & Girls Lacrosse, Boys & Girls Swimming & Diving, Softball, Boys Tennis, Boys & Girls Track and Boys Volleyball. Teams won League Championships, dominated League Tournaments, faced post-season playoff action in the NCS tournament and State finals and even raced at Nationals. We are still $8,000 short of our fundraising requirement for the year, please a donation today here to keep the Yellowjacket spirit going strong. Donations made now make you a part of the 2024-25 Booster Club.


Across thirteen weeks the combined junior varsity and varsity badminton team of 36 athletes participated in 16 meets with other schools, won more than 130 competitive matches, took part in the West Alameda County Conference league tournament, and qualified to compete in the North Coast Section championships. The team is especially proud of athletes who placed at WACC and represented the league at NCS: Antonio Quinto & Oliver Rose-Haiman with fourth place in boys doubles, Gleb Valuev with fifth place in boys singles, and Lexi Perez with seventh place in girls singles. Check out the incredible weekly season recap videos and photo highlights on the team’s instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/badmintonatbhs/ As a growing team it is exciting to see the development year over year at Berkeley High. With 26 athletes in 2022, 33 in 2023, and now up to 36 in 2024, badminton has gone from a no-cut sport students participated in for free PE credit to a rigorous, structured, and competitive team. Not only have the athletes and coaches fought for success and growth in the league, they also have been working hard to bring respect and community to the sport at Berkeley High!


Varsity Berkeley High Varsity Baseball went 12-12 for the season and qualified for the NCS playoffs for the fourteenth consecutive year. The team played through a lot of injuries and much adversity. Many underclassmen gained valuable experience at the varsity level. The team beat some very good teams like Cardinal Newman who is playing for a D2 section title and St. Mary’s (Stockton) who won the D1 section title in the San Joaquin Section. The team beat Piedmont who is playing for a section title and of course beating Bishop O’dowd twice in one season is always nice. Seven players gained post season honors including First Team All League players Trey Johnson and Jackson Ehrlich. Isaiah Mays, Quinton Hill and Antonio Nordman earned 2nd team All league while Akanni Owodunni and Keanu Moss earned Honorable Mention. Seven Seniors will be continuing to play baseball in college next year. Daniel Beadles, University of Pacific Will Polishuk, Pomona Pitzer Trey Johnson, Skyline JC Julian Ito, West Valley JC Antonio Nordman, West Valley JC Will O”Brien, Las Medanos JC

Junior VarsityJV Baseball finished the season with a 9-7-3 overall record and a 6-1-1 record in league, allowing the JV Jackets to finish in 1st place. The JV Jackets swept Bishop O’Dowd in the season series with Simon Scurlock, Ezra Brilliant and Maceo Rose anchoring the pitching rotation. Julian Adorador and Kyo Yura led the team in hitting. The team showed amazing resilience coming from behind to win several games including one come from behind win on the road in Stockton where they were down to their last out and behind by 4 runs and managed to score 7 runs in a row (without a recorded out) to win the game.
Freshman Highlights of the Freshman season include dominant victories over Alhambra and league opponents Bishop O’Dowd, Alameda, and Castro Valley. The Freshman team went 4-1 vs. league opponents. The team just got better and better as the year went on and the rain subsided, getting key contributions from everyone. Over the six games of the season, the Freshman had a team batting average of .343 and a team ERA of 2.73. What a finish!


This spring season BHS Crew had just under 100 athletes over four squads. Throughout the season the team had several top five finishes, ending the season by qualifying three boats for Scholastic Nationals and five boats making it to finals at Southwest Junior Championships with the boys club four finishing 2nd! The team has 12 seniors graduating this year who were on the team all four years at Berkeley High and many will continue to row/cox in college. We are excited to share that Ellery Garcia and Ela Novak committed to row in college at Puget Sound University and Washington State University, respectively. We are excited to see the program continue to grow over the next few seasons! Go Jackets!

The golf team finished the season with a record of 5-9, with 12 students participating. Unforgettable moments include the first win of the season at Monarch Bay GC vs San Leandro High and the low round of the year vs Castro Valley High School. Several players stood out this season, including Alex Neira and Eli Slifer, who earned all-league honors for the second year in a row. They also represented Berkeley High in the Division 1 playoffs.


This year, boys lacrosse had over 50 players on our JV and varsity teams. We finished with a record of 16-6, finished undefeated in league and won the WACC league championship 5-4 over Bishop O’Dowd. One of the most exciting games played was vs Vintage where Berkeley High was down 2-6 at halftime. The Yellowjackets went on to score the final 6 goals in the second half to win 8-6. The team was also down 1-3 in the league championship before rolling off four goals in a row to take control over the championship. The JV team started the year with over 20 brand new players and had a tremendous year of growth and learning. Hayden Hockenbrock was named WACC league Player of the Year. Players who received 1st team All League – Hayden Hockenbrock, Satchel Wells, Kenzo Egawa, Anthony Cherbini, Becker Hockenbrock, and Marc Rebusi. Ivan Watson received 2nd team honors and Max Zoidis and Sam Larner received all league honorable mention. Varsity team award honors were the following: Hayden Hockenbrock won Team MVP, Marc Rebusi won the Leadership Award, Owen Rieger won Unsung Hero, Eamonn Kaufer won Most Improved and Adrian Snow won the Coaches Award. The Ryan Taylor Most Inspirational Award winners were Ty Manning and Ja’Von Nichols. Congrats to the Berkeley High lacrosse program for a fantastic year.


Varsity The Girls Lacrosse team is seeing the benefits of the increased opportunities for youth lacrosse when these players were in elementary school, with the most experienced team Berkeley High has seen in decades. As proof, in a season highlight, the girls beat Bishop O’Dowd during regular season play for the first time in 10 years! Berkeley High is now regularly challenging teams that have historically beat the Yellowjackets – the bar has been raised! Several girls were recognized with All League Honors: Lane Imen, Christina Keung, Violet Potts and Sienna Prak-Perry all received First team honors. Sade Devine and Sabine Rosen earned Second team honors while Maya Miles-Wang and Tallulah Owsley received Honorable Mentions. In other exciting news, team captain Sienna Prak-Perry has committed to play college lacrosse at Dominican University next year and is the first player recruited to a college program in at least 12 years. The program is on the rise and the next few years should be exciting.
Junior Varsity For the 2024 season, JV filled a roster of 20 girls with many girls coming from summer & fall clubs and player-led practices leading up to try-outs. While the record didn’t include as many wins as desired, there was a lot of improvement from last year! This year, the team beat league rival Bishop O’Dowd 14-4, after losing last year 8-12. In the favorite game of the year vs Monte Vista, the team lost 9-6 but had the momentum to come back and win if only there was another quarter. To put it into perspective, Berkeley JV lost to Monte Vista last year 2-17, which clearly shows the progress this season! In terms of standout players there were new captains and team leadership from Avha (M), Sofia (M), and Tallulah (G) with 5 players recognized for stellar performance for the 2024 season. MVP Attack: Joycelyn Rodríguez scored many goals this season and was a constant threat whenever she had the ball. MVP Defense: Anna Swedlow was the cornerstone of the defense and led the team to executing a successful zone this year. MVP Midfield: Sabine Shaffer is an excellent athlete who picked up a stick for the first time this year and was a ground ball machine. Most Improved: Omoeghie Obidah switched to defense this year and quickly became our strongest chaser during zone defense Coaches Award: Emma Candler who consistently lived the team’s values and led by example of what a motivated and coachable player looks like.


Diving At the very first meet, the 4 varsity divers, Scarlett, Maya, Lucian, and Liam all qualified for NCS. Because the league only has 4 schools with diving programs, diving competed with schools outside the league including Acalanes, Las Lomas, Campolindo, Miramonte, and San Ramon. This season, 6 divers moved from novice to JV and one moved from JV to Varsity after mastering a required number of dives of increasing difficulty. At the League Championships, Diving placed 1st and 2nd in boys’ Varsity and 1st, 2nd, and 3rd in girls’ Varsity. At NCS, Diving placed 3rd and 7th in boys, and 7th in girls. Lucien, who placed 3rd, was then able to go onto the State competition. Lucien had an amazing day at the state competition in Clovis. He dove against not only the top divers in the state, but some of the best in the country. This was his second time at state and this year he placed 18th. He also now has the top BHS diving score for boys knocking off a 2009 score.Swim THREE-PEAT!The 2024 Swimming & Diving teams continued a run of success that hasn’t been seen in decades. Girls Varsity won its THIRD straight League title and sent five individuals and two relays to North Coast Sections. Boys Varsity continued its upward trajectory, missing 2nd place by a whisker and sending four individuals and two relays to NCS – and diver Lucien Geltman-Lamb to the State Championship Meet! How did it happen? Strength in numbers! At League Championships every single Berkeley High swimmer and diver scored points. No other team had that depth of quality—not even close. 83% of the swims were personal bests. School records were set in Boys Diving (Lucien Geltman-Lamb), the Girls 100 Breaststroke (Charlotte Livermore, for the 2nd year in a row), and the Girls 200 Medley Relay (Lily Schultz, Charlotte Livermore, freshman Samishka Chitnis, and Abril Esqueda). Charlotte won individual titles in breaststroke and the 200 Individual Medley, and Maya Merhige won the 500 freestyle by out-touching her distance training partner Anaya Lehman. New-to-Berkeley diver Scarlett Nykamp won girls diving. Over on the boys’ side, Lucien won the diving title and Connor Levi-Lamb and Yair Sas were the high-point swimmers, in butterfly and backstroke, respectively. Vacancies created by last year’s graduating seniors were filled by a fantastic group of new freshmen and rising sophomores. Meanwhile, the huge JV teams revealed their incredible potential by swimming personal bests week in and week out, over and over, throughout the season. The future is incredibly bright for the 80(!) Yellowjacket swimmers & divers. Next year, the senior girls fully intend to complete a four-year sweep with contributions from the next generation of swimmers and divers. The boys are equally committed to achieving their first League title in more than a decade. SWIMMING & DIVING ARE HAPPENING IN 2025!


Twenty-five athletes competed on the JV and Varsity Softball teams, finishing with an 11-12 record. This lead to a 3rd place finish in the regular season and an upset versus Mt. Eden in the WACC-12 Shoreline Playoffs, before losing to Encinal in the championship. Several players received All-League honors with Elisa Highton and Oona Capristo earning First Team All League honors, Addison Davis and Melody Castro earning Second Team All League honors and Charlotte Kurre-O’Heaney and Riley Pritchard being recognized with Honorable Mention. Camden Bernhard also had an incredible season The season started off slow but the team improved as the season progressed. The team’s record was a strong 5-1 in the last six games before losing in the league championship to Encinal, and losing to the #1 seed Cal High Grizzlies in the NCS playoffs. The team played tough but couldn’t string together any hits and lost 8-0.


Boys Tennis finished second in WACC with a 6 and 2 record and an overall record of 12 and 5. Two players were recognized as All League Singles: Sze Ting Chen and Yanir Charney Weintraub. Andrew Regan and Max Kirjanovski were recognized as All League Doubles and Honorable Mentions went to Bo Speirs and Damian Rodl.


Track and field at Berkeley High had a very successful season. The Yellowjackets did outstanding work at the League meet in Hayward, the boys placed second and the girls were third. Berkeley sent 17 field athletes to the Bayshore meet, a distinct improvement over previous years. Three school records were set in the distance races: boys and girls 1600 and boys 3200. At the conclusion of the season Berkeley High sent five individual runners to the State Meet in Clovis. All things considered, Berkeley High track and field is definitely on its way to a bright future.


What an amazing season for Boys Volleyball! 2 years removed from the NCS semi team that won league, the team made it back to the top, going 17-5 overall, 13-2 in conference play, and 10-0 in league play winning the league crown and an automatic berth into the NCS. The team easily dispatched the first opponents and eventually lost to the D1 Champion Foothill.

The 16th Annual BAF Golf Classic at Tilden Golf Course May 4 was a beautiful sun-filled afternoon of fun and golf. Make sure to join us next year for another great day with Berkeley High Coaches, alumni and supporters. The Berkeley Athletic Fund was pleased to support the 1400 student athletes representing Berkeley High. One benefit of this support this season was fewer injuries among athletes taking advantage of the Strength & Conditioning program funded by donations to BAF. Your tax-deductible contribution to the Berkeley Athletic Fund goes to work right here in Berkeley on the field, in the pool, on the court, or in the gym for the 1400 student athletes at Berkeley High. Become a Berkeley High Booster today!

Need some Jacket gear to show your school pride while cheering for your favorite team? Yellow Jacket gear is available year round on the Fan Store. Have a great summer and see you at a game in the Fall! Thanks to all our Business Sponsors this school year! Please thank them for supporting Berkeley High the next time you visit.

One final note from your editor – it’s been fun to put this season update together for you for the last three years. My youngest is graduating next week and we need a new editor to keep this going for the 5,000 people who receive it each season. Contact president@berkeleyathleticfund.net to sign up!