Two-sport balancing act

By CHRIS ERRINGTON

For Gulf High's Courtney McAuliffe, the time had come to act.

After three years of hearing the pleas, the Buccaneers' senior defender made her move - she would finally relent to girls cross country coach Dean Lofton and join the team. Even after realizing the additional demands the fall sport placed on her already incredibly tight schedule, McAuliffe is more than happy to have made the sacrifice.

So are her coaches.

Thanks to an outstanding fall season in which the Buccaneers reached last Saturday's state meet, McAuliffe joined an ever-increasing group of Pasco County girls soccer players whose schedules must be juggled to include two simultaneous sports. The situation has both athletes and coaches making concessions at nearly every step.

"This is my last year, and my sister Colleen is a sophomore, so I knew this was my last chance to run with her," McAuliffe said. "I think the key is learning how to manage your time well. You have to be organized if you're going to be able to handle everything."

McAuliffe manages a 3.6 GPA despite holding a job at Publix, playing club team soccer and running spring track in addition to her role as one of Gulf's key soccer players. She finished 78th overall at the state meet with a time of 21:16, just nine seconds off her personal best in the 3.1-mile race. The Buccaneers' sixth-place finish at the region meet and 18th-place showing at the state meet were a reminder of how much time and effort McAuliffe gave.

For Gulf soccer coach Shari Schau, helping her star defender juggle two sports any way she could was the least she could do.

"This was a mutual decision by all of us," Schau said of McAuliffe's decision to run cross country this year. "High school is supposed to be a fun time, so I think it's great for the kids to be in as many sports as possible. Plus, when you have someone like Courtney, you don't worry about her doing an outstanding job for both teams. She's done that for the cross country team and she's doing the same for us now."

McAuliffe, who has missed just two games as a four-year starter for the Buccaneers' soccer team, came to a practice-schedule agreement with both Schau and Lofton that allowed the senior to run with the cross country team immediately after school, then join the soccer team for most of its two-hour practice. Not surprisingly to Schau, McAuliffe hasn't missed a step during the transition.

"Doing both sports didn't take anything away from her," the coach said. "When you have as much talent as Courtney does, it won't take long for her to get back into soccer shape."

While Gulf has started a bit slowly this season at 3-3, 2-1 in Class 4A-District 8, other programs like defending Class 5A-District 7 champion River Ridge have learned to adjust to players missing from the roster or from practices due to fall sports commitments. The Royal Knights currently are 6-0-1 to lead the district, even though coach Skip Glover said before the season that some adjustments would have to be made early.

"We all go through the same things," Glover said. "We have seniors that have been playing together since they were freshmen, but many of them won't be on the field for us at the beginning of the season.

"The first two weeks, it's a bit of patchwork."

Now, with cross country over and the focus squarely on soccer, Schau can relax knowing she has one of her best players back full time. Still, the coach acknowledged she wouldn't hesitate to help another Buccaneers' athlete attempt the same feat.

"We know we are taking some chances injury-wise when an athlete plays two sports and that's our main concern, but you can get hurt anywhere so why not play both if you can?" Schau said.