Junior Ebby Asamoah and Senior Davis Long are preparing to play in the biggest game of their lives later this afternoon. The two Montgomery County natives and Delaware Blue Hens players will take on #2 seed Villanova at 2:45 this afternoon.
Asamoah is a Magruder High School graduate. Asamoah has started 19 games this year, averaging 7.2 points and 3.6 rebounds per game. Some highlights from his time at Magruder:
Richard Montgomery High School’s Nadia Estrada won the 135 lb weight class 2022 Girls’ State Championship at the Showplace Arena in Upper Marlboro– her 2nd state title.
She won it all at 122 lbs in 2020, one week before everything shut down due to Covid-19 restrictions and was unable to defend her championship last year due to continued restrictions.
Watkins Mill High School students Jabew Ewane and Nebi Tsarni were both successful in becoming Girls’ Wrestling 2022 State Champions.
Jabea is a freshman who just started wrestling this year. She fought hard all season, wrestling varsity competition at the 182- and 170-pound weight classes. She took second place at the Winter Mill Girls Tournament earlier in the season and has greatly improved throughout the year. She won her State Championship match 6-0.
Cincinnati Bengals
Another Super Bowl MoCo Connection: Terrell Lewis, OLB for the Los Angeles Rams
Montgomery County Native Sofia Harrison will be playing in the 2022 AFC Women’s Asian Cup for the Philippines in the semifinal against South Korea on Thursday, February 3rd.
The Philippine women’s football team on Monday booked a ticket to the FIFA Women’s World Cup by defeating Chinese Taipei in a penalty shootout in the quarterfinal round of the Women’s Asian Cup in India to make it to the semifinals and qualify for the World Cup. No Philippine football team, men or women, has ever qualified for the World Cup until now.
The Cincinnati Bengals travel to Kansas City to take on the Chiefs in the AFC Championship game while the San Fransisco 49ers head south to L.A. to play the Rams in the NFC Championship game. Each year when we get to this point, we try to highlight as many connections to Montgomery County, MD as we can find so let’s get to it!
Cincinnati Bengals
MCPS Athletics has sent a letter to the community include welcoming back spectators at 25% capacity starting on 1/29, and updates on overnight travel as well as an updated Return to RAISE Plan.
The full letter can be seen below:
Blake High School athletic director Jared Fribush announced the hiring of Bryon Marshall as the new variety football head coach at the school. He has been the Junior variety head coach since 2017 and will be taking over for DeShawn Anderson, who stepped down following the fall season.
Additional information can be seen below, courtesy of Blake High School Athletics:
Seneca Valley High School has announced the hiring of Joseph Rankin as the new varsity football coach. Rankin, who graduated from Seneca Valley in 2009, played professionally for four years, including a stint with the Cleveland Browns.
He has been defensive coordinator at the school for the last three years under Justin Sickeri, who he takes over for.
MoCo natives Stefon and Trevon Diggs have dominated the NFL this year. The brothers, who grew up in Gaithersburg, were both recently selected as Pro Bowlers for this NFL season.
Stefon grew up in Gaithersburg and attended Good Counsel High School in Olney, where he played football and ran track. He recorded 810 yards receiving with 23 touchdowns as a junior in 2010, and was runner-up for the Gatorade Maryland Player of the Year. As a senior, he recorded 770 yards receiving and 8 touchdowns, and racked up 277 rushing yards and three more touchdowns on the ground. He was named to the All-Metro team by The Washington Post both seasons.
New communication was sent out to the MCPS community by MCPS Athletics. The letter to the community can be seen below:
Dear MCPS Community: