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I remember growing up in Pleasanton and the incredible amount of coverage youth and high school sports received.
It was amazing and the community thrived on the attention. When I made the decision to get a degree in journalism, I wanted to pay it back to the local athletes.
I knew how I would carry the memories I had and wanted the next group of athletes to have a chance to do the same. For 26 years I worked at the Tri-Valley Herald, for many years as the local sports editor, which was the person who oversaw the East Bay Athletic League and all local youth sports.
Slowly the coverage dwindled, and when the Herald and the Valley Times — our rival newspaper — merged, the signs were clear: Local sports coverage was going to take a hit.
When I started at the Herald in the fall of 1985, we had five full-time writers just to cover the EBAL. Every football, basketball and baseball game was covered — by both local papers.
By the time I took a buyout (the writing was clearly on the wall and being shoved down our throats) I was the lone preps writer left at the Herald.
When the Pleasanton Weekly offered me the chance to keep local coverage alive in Pleasanton, I jumped at the chance. A few years back they came to me with the Tri-Valley Preps Playbook — an online weekly release on all of the EBAL — it was another thing I couldn’t pass up.
Now the Playbook, which is free but requires signing up to get the email every Tuesday during the academic year, features things such as Power Rankings for many of the sports, a weekly slate of action and the Big Picture, a weekly column about anything related to local high school sports.
If you go to www.pleasantonweekly.com and sign up, you will get it delivered to your inbox each week.
It makes me happy each year to see other local organizations still honoring the local high school athletes for their accomplishments. TV30 is one such group.
The show “Tri-Valley Sports Final”, which I hosted each week when I was with the Herald, shows highlights of high school action during the school year and then youth sports during the summer, as well as celebrates the end of each high school year.
It was a blast joining Ian Bartholmew and the late iconic local sports figure Dr. B, hosting the show each week.
This time it was their 30th annual Outstanding High School Athletic Awards. Some 25 awards were presented to high school students from Dublin, Livermore and Pleasanton to honor them for their outstanding athletic accomplishments.
Viewers can watch the televised program broadcasting on Comcast Channel 30 or AT&T U-Verse via Channel 99. It is also available streaming and video on demand at tv30.org.
Participants in the program also included Livermore Mayor John Marchand, Pleasanton Mayor Karla Brown and Dublin Vice Mayor Sherry Hu.
Chris Williams, the cross-country and track/field coach for Dublin High, was picked as the Coach of the Year.
Williams has led the two Dublin programs for 16 years and has established the Gaels cross-country and track/field as elite programs not just locally, but statewide as well.
“Even more important than the victories are the positive ways he’s impacted his athletes’ lives,” Bartholomew said of Williams.
Those student-athletes were honored at the banquet as current “Tri-Valley Sports Final” hosts Bartholomew and Tim Sbranti presented the awards to the 2024 honorees. They were:
Foothill High School: Katie Salonga, volleyball; Paige Bennett, volleyball; Riley Young, basketball; Beti Terpstra, basketball; Marissa Anderson, softball; Kaycie Burdick, softball; and Nate Novitske, baseball.
Amador Valley High School: Tristan Ti’a, football; and Matthew Foley, baseball.
Dublin High School: Garrett Esomonu, football; Jalen Stokes, basketball; Lana Nguyen, wrestling; Tanaya Barrett, softball; and Kaitlin Lee, swimming.
Livermore High School: Kamarri Robinson, football; Xavier Thorpe, football/basketball; Jae Cosgriff, softball; and Tanner Lee, baseball.
Granada High School: Quinn Boyd, football; NaVaughn Long, basketball; Cortevious Taylor, basketball; Lauren Nguyen, wrestling; Parker Warner, baseball; Saskia Raab, softball; and Sarah Deplitch, softball.
Editor’s note: Dennis Miller is a contributing sports writer for Embarcadero Media Foundation’s East Bay Division. To contact him about his Pleasanton Preps column, email acesmag@aol.com.
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