Sports

Parkway North Baseball State Title Bid Earns Top 2012 Sports Story Honor

The Vikings went on a wild ride in search of the school's first state baseball championship.

2012 was a busy year in sports for Creve Coeur.

It saw prep athletes like Brandon Sheperd, Donavin Newsom and DJ Johnson sign on the dotted line to play football or basketball at the next level for major Division I programs. It saw a Creve Coeur alum, Chaminade's Bradley Beal drafted third overall by the NBA's Washington Wizards.

Andy Bauer, then only a sophomore, made headlines when he made a verbal pledge to play football at Missouri. He's since re-opened his recruitment and is still being sought out by some of the top schools in the country.

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At the team level, Whitfield Hockey won a crown, Parkway North basketball won the school's first ever district championship, and a powerhouse Chaminade Soccer team made it to the state finals, only to be turned away by rival CBC.

But in your editor's humble opinion, the top Creve Coeur Patch Sports Story of 2012 goes to the Parkway North Varsity Baseball team, which went 22-10-2, en route to the school's first appearance in the state finals.

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The Vikings went 2-5 early on in the season, and then juggled the pitching rotation to make way for a freshman (Joey Reeves) and a sophomore (Joe Hope) who started the season on the JV squad. Reeves tossed a complete game shutout down the stretch of the season and all Hope did was throw a no-hitter in the state semifinals.

The Vikings lost the state title in dramatic fashion with Rockwood Summit's Eric Beisel getting a walk off single, but the players, families and Parkway North fans who were on that wild May and June ride to Springfield will have a memory that lasts forever.

I'm looking forward to seeing what the Vikings do in 2013 with a roster that includes a lot of returning talent.

Good Luck Coach: 2012 was the last year for Chaminade's Doug Taylor roaming the sidelines for the Red Devil Football program, after 16 seasons. A coach who had a hand in developing the likes of Christian Suntrup, Rob Standard, Jack Meiners and Ben Lueken, among countless others, remains at the school and on the bench as an assistant for Kelvin Lee's basketball program. We wish him all the best.

Craziest Game Of The Year: I couldn't write this column without noting what had to have been the wildest contest I'd seen in person all year. De Smet Jesuit's comeback against CBC in the state football quarterfinals which turned into a 56-35 rout in a matter of about 2 minutes.


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