On May 20, senior athletes, parents and coaches gathered at Sam’s Anchor Cafe in Tiburon to recognize and celebrate the seniors committed to Redwood athletics over their past four years of high school. This event looked very different from years prior due to its new venue, as Sam’s Anchor Cafe generously donated the space and provided food for the evening. In the past, the Redwood Athletics’ Senior Night took place at Embassy Suites in San Rafael and was quite expensive to put together. In previous years, senior athletes attended for free and received a meal; parents had to pay to attend, but this year, families could attend at no cost.
At this year’s banquet, Sam’s Anchor Cafe provided bite-size food to all in attendance. This led to many gathering around picnic tables where attendees ate until the awards began at around 7 pm. Surprisingly, the award ceremony only lasted 20 minutes leading to the event being fairly short.
In past years, the banquet lasted several hours, as each coach had time to speak about their sports award-winning athletes. For many, this added a more intimate element to the night, but unlike in past years, these speeches were not in the program this year.
Samantha Hann, a field hockey player and two-time Marin County Athletic League (MCAL) Player of the Year, received the Don Kreps award for female senior athletes, but with the absence of coach speeches she was left clueless to its meaning.
“I had to go look up [the meaning of this award] later when I got home because I didn’t know who it was or why I got it. So I was confused,” Hann said.
Although Hann doesn’t want the event to span many hours as it did in years past, she hopes the event will be adapted next year to include time for individual awards and sports.“I think it could be shorter [than past years], but still have a moment for each sport, and then recognize each of the athletes given awards,” Hann said.
Despite the shortcomings of Hann’s experience, some other senior athletes found the event very positive. Such as Nora Lynch, a senior who received the Andrew O’Dorisio Award – an award meant for athletes who have persevered through health scares. O’Dorisio’s parents – the student the Andrew O’Dorisio Award is named after – even came to the banquet to share their son’s story prior to the dedication of the award. Last year, Lynch had a significant heart issue, which prevented her from playing over half of the lacrosse season. Despite this setback, this year, she returned and successfully played the entire season. James and Kristi O’Dorisio’s speeches imparted heavy emotions to the audience, even drawing a few tears. Lynch herself connected very deeply with the stories they shared about their son.
“I talked to [Mr. and Mrs. O’Dorisio for a while; we were the] last people to leave Sam’s. They are lovely people and were excited to be still involved with Redwood because their son was so involved. They told me life chose you, so now you have to go do something great,” Lynch said.
While not everyone had as beneficial an experience as Lynch, and many even felt the event disregarded their accomplishments it’s hard for a reunion of coaches, athletes, and parents to be dull.
