Welcome back! Another high school sports year begins

Happy Tuesday … and hello again!

I hope you had a great summer, short as it might have been for some of us. For many of you, it probably is ongoing, even as the start of school approaches as soon as next week in some areas.

In this corner, summer effectively ended last week as fall sports swung into action. Golf season began a week ago Monday — teams were allowed to both practice and play tournaments and matches as soon as that day — and all other fall teams were cleared to begin practice Thursday .

If for no other reason than the sheer number of sports, fall is the most hectic sports season for administrators, fans and the media. Football obviously casts a long shadow over everything else going on the next few months, but as always, our commitment is to cover all sports for our entire audience as accurately and thoroughly as possible.

That began in recent weeks with some early football stories, including a look at some of central Ohio’s top seniors , top juniors , top games to watch , the entire season schedule and our area’s new head coaches . (We inadvertently omitted Linden-McKinley’s Casey Mock from the latter story.)

A new feature this season is called “Coaches Confidential.” Our first installment dealt with the best ways to earn playing time.

Much, much more is coming. Scroll down for more details.

This high school sports season is guaranteed to feature a different complexion than years past, including expanded tournament divisions in many tournament sports. When it comes to the fall, boys soccer and girls soccer will feature five divisions instead of three, and girls volleyball seven instead of five.

None of the state golf tournaments will be played at Ohio State . They instead will be spread between suburban Dayton, Akron and Sunbury, and all will be played within a five-day span in the first half of October.

Football will creep a little later into December by virtue of the calendar. Because Thanksgiving is Nov. 28 this year, the latest possible date for the holiday, the state finals will be from Dec. 5-7 in Canton.

Before launching into a recap of the summer, two notes:

- Thanks to all of you, this newsletter experienced unprecedented growth last year, far more than I ever could have envisioned. I appreciate you taking time out of your day to catch up on the news and read my thoughts on high school sports. Several of you shared complimentary emails in June when the newsletter went on hiatus. They are appreciated.

- A personal goal for the upcoming season: I will do my best not to call athletes “kids.” I do it without thinking and none ever seem bothered when I catch myself (some even laugh and say they understand, given that I’m 46), but they are young adults after all. I am not sure I argued with being called a kid when I was 17, but I didn’t mind not being called one either.

Now, on to the news of the summer:

Top headlines: News slowed the past two months, but did not stop. Here are some of the top headlines, not all, since the middle of June …

- Olentangy football coach Wade Bartholomew sacrificed during a time of need for school athletic secretary Lisa Daragona, donating her one of his kidneys .

Here is a video from my feature on Wade and Lisa.

- Gahanna graduate Maycey Vieta dove in the Olympics on Monday for Puerto Rico, from which she has ancestry through her father. Here is my story on her road to Paris , where she finished 24 ^th in 10-meter platform .

- The Dublin Jerome girls golf team, led by senior Alexa Prettyman, proved itself as one of the nation’s best in July in suburban Dallas.

- Dublin Coffman’s Loc Webber and Mount Vernon’s Alex Taylor won national championships at the U.S. Marine Corps Junior and 16U Nationals in July in Fargo, North Dakota.

- Just hours before the final newsletter of 2023-24 was sent, Andy Asmo announced his resignation after a wildly successful run as Jerome boys lacrosse coach. A few weeks ago, former Ohio State player Jon Ewert was announced as his successor .

- Related to the divisional alignment referenced above, two central Ohio teams sought and received permission from the OHSAA to remain in Division I .

- Check out th is big-time boys basketball event coming to Columbus in late December. The 34-team field includes several perennial powers in games spanning three days.

- And in more basketball news, Westerville South star Kruz McClure will not play his senior season for the Wildcats .

Central Ohio Sports Awards: The final event of our 2023-24 year was the Central Ohio Sports Awards on June 20 at Mershon Auditorium. I was lucky enough to emcee the evening’s festivities and close the book on another exciting sports season in central Ohio.

Here is our recap of that evening.

Here are photos from that evening, and video .

Among the “premier” honors were boys and girls teams of the year, boys and girls coaches of the year and boys and girls athletes of the year.

All-Metro: All of our All-Metro teams were recognized at the Central Ohio Sports Awards, as were athletes and coaches of the year in every sport.

See the spring honorees at these links …

- Our full All-Metro baseball team , and a story on Coach of the Year Mike Weaver from Olentangy Berlin

- Boys lacrosse: Olentangy Liberty star Jake Struck headlined our team after leading the Patriots to the Division I state championship, and Pickerington Central’s Brent Walton was Coach of the Year

- Girls lacrosse: DeSales’ Joe Finotti is Coach of the Year after guiding the Stallions to their third Division II state title, and Liberty’s Isabelle Pohmer earned Player of the Year after the Patriots won Division I

- Softball: Our Player of the Year is familiar, and our Coach of the Year took his team to uncharted territory

- Boys tennis: Bexley swept the top honors, with both Player and Coach of the Year wearing Lions blue

- Boys track and field: Continuing the theme from tennis, Westerville North swept top honors with both our athlete and coach of the year

- Girls track and field: Rinse and repeat, but move less than two miles up the road to Westerville Central to find our girls athlete and coach of the year

- Boys volleyball: Liberty’s Caden Whiteside repeated as Player of the Year, and St. Charles coach Ned Gruber grabbed those top honors after leading the Cardinals to state

What’s coming?: The best answer might be “what isn’t?”

This week alone, we will take a look at the area’s top projected boys and girls golfers, a tracker of football players who transferred in the offseason and feature our first installment of “burning questions” for the upcoming football season.

We also will begin breaking down central Ohio’s top football players by position, along with polls that will allow you to vote for your perceived top player by position.

It is just 17 days to the start of football season. Rest assured that time will fly by, as will the next four months. They always do.

By the time the last state championship game wraps up Dec. 7 in Canton, we will be only 18 days from Christmas.

Athlete of the week: Once again this year, you can help us pick the top central Ohio athlete by the week with the return of our Athlete of the Week poll. That returns later this month.

Keep in mind, nominations are accepted through noon Monday for events of the previous week. The poll is then open until 4 p.m. Friday.

Learn how to nominate an athlete here .

Here is a look back at each Athlete of the Week from 2023-24 .

That’s it for this week.

If you like what you see, continue to subscribe to the Dispatch. Tell a friend to check us out, too. Your support is incredibly important to us, and we thank you for it.

See you next week!

Dave Purpura, sports reporter

dpurpura@dispatch.com

@dp_dispatch

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Welcome back! Another high school sports year begins