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tinleyjunction.com sports<br />
the Tinley Junction | April 11, 2019 | 39<br />
fastbreak<br />
THURSDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK<br />
PepsiCo Series could be popping on and off the field<br />
1st and 3<br />
PHOTO SUBMITTED<br />
A FEW HEAVY<br />
FACTS ABOUT THE<br />
WEIGHTLIFTING<br />
PROGRAM AT TINLEY<br />
PARK HIGH SCHOOL<br />
1. It’s a go<br />
Fifteen <strong>TP</strong>HS athletes<br />
took part in a<br />
recent weightlifting<br />
seminar and one of<br />
the guest coaches<br />
was Bears assistant<br />
strength coach<br />
Pierre Ngo.<br />
2. Seasoning<br />
Those athletes<br />
who are in season<br />
lift lighter weights<br />
just to keep the<br />
muscles active.<br />
Those who are<br />
out of season lift<br />
heavier amounts.<br />
3. Bye-bye skinny fat<br />
Instructor Cassie<br />
Gaines (above)<br />
says the program<br />
helps athletes who<br />
are “skinny fat,”<br />
meaning those who<br />
are in shape but<br />
do not have a lot of<br />
muscle.<br />
Jeff Vorva<br />
Sports Editor<br />
Andrew’s soccer team, shown before a match earlier in the season, is in the PepsiCo Showdown, which soon will<br />
turn into the PepsiCo Showdown Series and feature more sports. JEFF VORVA/22ND CENTURY MEDIA<br />
Two District 230<br />
girls soccer teams,<br />
Andrew and Stagg,<br />
opened play in the final<br />
PepsiCo Showdown,<br />
on Saturday, April 6, at<br />
Olympic Park in Schaumburg.<br />
Do not worry, soccer<br />
fans: The tournament<br />
itself is not going anywhere.<br />
But it is being<br />
re-branded.<br />
For the past 17 years,<br />
the event was open to<br />
boys soccer teams, and<br />
in 2008 to both boys and<br />
girls teams. After this<br />
event, which features<br />
hundreds of schools,<br />
wraps up on April 14, the<br />
soccer tournament will be<br />
a fraction of something<br />
even bigger: the PepsiCo<br />
Showdown Series.<br />
The plan is for this to<br />
extend into tournaments<br />
for sports such as volleyball,<br />
cross country, basketball,<br />
football, lacrosse —<br />
wait a minute. Football?<br />
Yes, football.<br />
The other sports will be<br />
featured later this year. In<br />
2021, the year the Illinois<br />
High School Association<br />
is going to wipe out<br />
conferences and implement<br />
a district system,<br />
the football tournament<br />
will start. Starting that<br />
year across the state, only<br />
district games with count<br />
for or against a team for<br />
playoff consideration.<br />
Two non-district games<br />
will not.<br />
So, PepsiCo Showdown<br />
Series Executive Director<br />
Joe Trost, who grew up on<br />
the border of Mokena and<br />
Orland Park, has swooped<br />
in and is hoping to use<br />
those first two weeks of<br />
the season as a bunch<br />
of two-week, four-team<br />
tournaments for elite<br />
teams held at Benedictine<br />
in Lisle one weekend and<br />
Robert Morris University<br />
in Arlington Heights the<br />
next.<br />
“It’s a 16-team tournament<br />
broken into pods of<br />
four,” Trost said. “Colleges<br />
can send a scout<br />
and see 16 schools at one<br />
site in 36 hours. There are<br />
schools from all over the<br />
nation. We’ve got them<br />
all. The model is to have<br />
all teams at one site on<br />
back-to-back weekends.”<br />
Look for Lincoln-Way<br />
East, Brother Rice and<br />
Marist to represent the<br />
south suburbs.<br />
Trost, a communications<br />
and marketing guru<br />
who got his start as a<br />
sports writer of a twiceweekly<br />
newspaper in the<br />
south suburbs that doesn’t<br />
exist anymore, helped turn<br />
the soccer tournaments<br />
into monsters. He hopes<br />
to do the same thing in<br />
several other sports.<br />
But here’s the key: The<br />
soccer tournaments have<br />
received publicity for action<br />
on the field as well as<br />
off the field. If you want<br />
to get into one of these<br />
bad boy tournaments,<br />
your team must agree to<br />
do some acts of kindness.<br />
Thousands of soccer players<br />
have done their part,<br />
and Trost is aiming for a<br />
lot more to get on board<br />
with the expansion.<br />
Many of the projects<br />
involve helping those less<br />
fortunate.<br />
“In January, football<br />
teams will be doing<br />
something in their communities,”<br />
Trost said. “In<br />
February, it’s volleyball<br />
teams. In March, soccer.<br />
We’ll do something all<br />
year.”<br />
Trost has had several<br />
heartwarming moments<br />
since the start of the event<br />
in 2003. One sticks out in<br />
his mind.<br />
“Hands down, it was<br />
the first time we surprised<br />
a school with bikes,” he<br />
said. “It hit all of us. It<br />
was March, 2016, and the<br />
thing I realize is that when<br />
you give a bike to a kid<br />
who has never had a bike<br />
before, there is just an excitement<br />
you don’t always<br />
get to see.<br />
“I watched WGN [TV]<br />
after we did this, and they<br />
talked to these kids and all<br />
of a sudden, they go to the<br />
mom and the mom is crying.<br />
And the mom is crying<br />
because she couldn’t<br />
afford to buy a bike for<br />
the kid. I was sitting there<br />
watching it after the event<br />
and I realized we did<br />
make a difference.”<br />
There should be a lot<br />
more where that came<br />
from in the future.<br />
LISTEN UP<br />
“Now, with my athletes, I’m trying to develop power, strength<br />
and speed so it transfers onto their playing field.”<br />
Cassie Gaines — Tinley Park High School weightlifting instructor<br />
Tune In<br />
Baseball<br />
4:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 17<br />
• Tinley Park hosts Sandburg, a team that finished<br />
fourth in the state in Class 4A in 2018.<br />
Index<br />
36 - Sports roundup<br />
35 - Athlete of the Week<br />
Compiled by Sports Editor Jeff Vorva
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