The Silverton High football program wound up another superlative season on Nov. 17 when the Foxes fell 43-19 to Mountain View of Bend in the Class 5A semifinals. Silverton finished 11-1 and downed long-time rival West Albany twice by a composite 90-42 score
The Foxes, now in their second year under coach Dan Lever, have made the playoffs every season since 2011 under a trio of head coaches, with John Mannion and Josh Craig preceding Lever. In that 13-year stretch Silverton has won one title (2021), taken second once (2014), made the semifinals four other times and advanced three times to the quarterfinals.
When I talked with Lever last week, he sounded like he would have been happy to be going to practice later in the afternoon.
“How you look at it depends on what kind of year you had,” he said. “If you had a bad year you might need a bit more time away from it. But if you had a good year and a lot of guys coming back, then you are excited and the energy is still there.”
The Foxes return four players of the year in the Mid-Willamette Conference, quarterback Sawyer Teeney (top offensive player), two-way linemen Brash Henderson (top offensive lineman) and Eli Willis (top defensive lineman) and linebacker Daniel Kuenzi (defensive player of the year. In addition, key contributors Hudson Waples (WR), Logan Uitto (RB), Bo Zurcher (LB), Brody Kuenzi (TE-DE), Sutton Kuenzi (WR), Zavian Black and Oliver Zurbrugg (O-line) and Max Mulick (TE) also return.
In addition, there is the annually superb freshman program that keeps churning out good prospects and a coaching stability that features a slew of top assistants such as Matt Craig, John Howard, Pat Scott, Eric Anderson, John Horner, Mike Fessler, Jim Barr and Don Von Weller. A couple of the coaches even go back to the era of Scott Gragg, who preceded Mannion.
The Foxes historically develop players well and tend to reload rather than rebuild. And that development process always yields surprises, Lever said.
“We’ve got a good corps of kids who buy in and are willing to do what it takes and we see direct results,” he said. “And it’s always interesting to see which guys will be surprises. Guys you think might not contribute much at all, but they put the work in and now they’re all-league. That’s a big jump. I see it happening.
“And the same principle works in life, too. If you really invest you can be something and get somewhere. You’re not guaranteed anything, but you get nothing if you don’t work hard.”
Cross Country/Alumni Watch: Alejandra Lopez, a former state champion at Kennedy High, earned all-American status for her performance Nov. 17 in the NAIA national championships. Lopez, a senior at Southern Oregon University in Ashland, finished 33rd in the meet, running the 6,000-meter course at Fort Vancouver in 22:28.1. Lopez’s run helped the Raiders finish eighth as a team.
Former Silverton standout Jori Paradis, meanwhile, took 10th at the NCAA Division II West Regionals at the Ash Creek Preserve Nov. 4 in Monmouth. Paradis, a grad student at Concordia/Irvine, ran 21:15.5 over 6,000 meters and helped the Golden Eagles to a 4th place finish.
Volleyball: Kennedy placed three athletes on the all-Tri-River Conference all stars. Freshman setter Grace Traeger was selected to the third team and sophomore libero Ari Iven and senior middle blocker Leah Smith received honorable mention.
