By Sophia Pu | Staff Writer

   As high school sports teams compete in the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) championships, Gabrielino High School leads in girls soccer, boys basketball, girls basketball, track and field, baseball, and girls golf.

The girls soccer team are the Mission Valley League champions, winning 11-1 in the league. They lost 1-2 in their most recent game against Costa Mesa High School on May 14.

   Junior Haley Mo’okini, captain of the girls soccer team, stated, “In regards to CIF we like to focus one game at a time and usually do not think about the next round or the finals until we get there. This year’s CIF [was] a little tougher compared to last year, but I [felt] very confident about our chances in advancing farther.”

Both the boys and girls basketball teams are Mission Valley League champions. The girls finished undefeated, and the boys won 11 games and lost 1 game.

   “This season has been so fun,” stated girls basketball captain Kyra Yoshitani. “Despite having a shortened season due to COVID and all, our team’s chemistry and overall performance has been great!”

The Gabrielino boys track team are the undefeated champions of their league, with Lance Avery, Brendan Tsai and Thien Le advancing to CIF.

   At the Arcadia Invitational on May 8, senior Dominic Gonzalez won first place in the 400 meters and senior Nicolas DiConti broke the school record, running 3200 meters in nine minutes, 20 seconds.

   “Breaking the distance school records has been my goal since Junior year, and this year I finally got the opportunity to,” said DiConti.

   Finishing in third place, the girls golf team qualified to go to CIF playoffs for the seventh year in a row. However, the playoffs coincided with senior activities and final exams, so the team did not participate.

They won against San Marino High School, La Cañada High School, and Alhambra High School, and lost to South Pasadena High School and Temple City High School.

   “I am still so proud of us being able to compete at our highest abilities this year despite the weird and inconvenient season we had,” said senior Madeline Tao, captain of the girls golf team.

   Gabrielino’s baseball team is finished in second place, winning 7-2 against El Monte on Wednesday. Though they were only able to play two months of baseball this year, the team won the league championship and will be going to the playoffs.

   Senior Nicolas Castillo, captain of the baseball team, made a two-run home run against El Monte High School and two three-run home runs against Mountain View. In the game against Arroyo High School, senior Isaac Christensen made a Grand Slam home run while senior Dylan Goodrich pitched seven straight innings with eight strikeouts.

   “This year has been the best year of baseball that I have ever played throughout my four years of high school baseball,” said Castillo. “Ultimately, our goal [was] to play with 110% of our effort.”

   On the girls swim team, sophomore Morgan Ogata, a diver, placed third at CIF. On the boys swim team, senior Andrew Ngo placed eighth in the 100 meter backstroke and fifteenth in the 200 meter individual medley.

   Boys volleyball also made it to CIF, finishing 6-5 and earning fourth place. Their last match was played on May 13 against South Pasadena.

   The boys wrestling team had a successful season, finishing in second place in league and qualifying for CIF. Unfortunately, the team lost by default in the first round because there were not enough Eagles competing. This was due to the long pandemic and many students not returning to competition this spring.

Although the girls wrestling team did not advance to CIF, the team won a duel against Mountain View High School to end their season on a high note.