The Student Leadership committee has selected fifteen students from a competitive list of over eighty applicants to serve as the 2021-22 CHSAA State Reps. The final selections, which include a diverse group of students from every corner of Colorado, each offer unique backgrounds and perspectives that stood out among their peers.
“I was impressed with the resumes of each applicant,” said CHSAA assistant commissioner Justin Saylor, who oversees student leadership. “Each student had proven leadership qualities, which made narrowing the list down extremely difficult. I commend the committee for their hard work and look forward to working with this group of State Reps over the course of next school year.”
The State Reps will have a daunting task ahead as they continue to navigate the obstacles put forth by the COVID-19 pandemic that shifted all 2020-2021 CHSAA Student Leadership events to virtual platforms and will continue into the 2021 Summer Conference.
Led by State Rep Advisor Trey Downey (Central HS – Grand Junction), the group will go to work right away, planning for all Student Leadership programming for the upcoming school year.
State Reps will have myriad responsibilities, some of which include sitting on various CHSAA committees, assisting in the coordination of Student Leadership Summer and Fall Conferences, and being a voice for the CHSAA student body as a whole.
The final list includes two returning State Reps and thirteen new members, comprising ten seniors, three juniors, and two sophomores.
In the final coaches poll of the Season C regular season, Denver South, Thomas Jefferson, Glenwood Springs, Buena Vista and Hoehne were voted No. 1 in their respective classifications.
The rankings, voted upon by coaches, are the official polls of the Association. Polls are released each Monday.
Voted upon by coaches around the state. New voters can sign up by emailing bcochi@chsaa.org. These rankings are part of the postseason seeding process.
Even though it’s his job to be the inspirational guy, Denver South’s Ryan Marini can’t help but be inspired by football players.
He’s seen a player lose his house to a fire and the team had to deal with the tragic loss of teammate Davarie Armstrong to a shooting last summer. After an 18-15 win over Vista PEAK on April 17, the Ravens were voted as the top Class 5A team in the state.
They play with heavy hearts and it had fueled an undefeated regular season. Marini is the guy who takes charge of the team but he’s also the first one to say it’s his guys who make this team special, not the coach. Still, it takes the right kind of leader to help these young men through the tragedies that they have dealt with and push them to be at their absolute best, both in football and in life.
That was certainly the case on Saturday. After the win over Vista PEAK, Marini was named the Denver Broncos high school football coach of the week.
Previous stops: Lincoln assistant coach (2002-04, 2012); Heritage assistant (2005-07); Cherry Creek (2008-09); Denver South assistant (2013, 2016); Littleton assistant coach (2014-15); Denver South head coach (2017-present).
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Question: Why do you coach?
Marini To give me to give my wife a break mostly. Honestly, I kind of have selfish reasons. For 19 years, I think the best inspiration I’ve found is working with DPS kids. They’re the most inspirational kids that I’ve ever worked with in my life. And yeah, I work hard for them, but the stuff they give back to me, it’s just the coolest stories and the most amazing stories. I learn about life from them because they come from such different backgrounds. It’s been awesome to absorb all that and it has completely changed my life, being a coach in DPS.
Q: Why do you coach the way that you coach?
Marini I’m a pretty energetic person. I think bringing the energy and positivity is probably one of my biggest strengths as a person. I really try to transfer that over in the classroom the same way, trying to make things fun. Social studies isn’t always the most isn’t everyone’s favorite subject, but I try to make it fun and try to bring that fun over to football and we don’t get paid for this, so we have to have something. If we don’t enjoy it what’s the point of doing it?
Q: What do you think it’s like to be coached by you?
Marini Entertaining for sure. I tend to be a very outspoken person. I hope in my players think I’m demanding, but I also hope they think I’m someone they can approach and that I listen to them and I hear from them as well. It’s not just a dictatorship. It’s a relationship built on trust.
Q: Coming into this year, a lot of people had Vista PEAK as a favorite to kind of dominate 5A and run away with this Season C title. At what point did you kind of have it in your head that you wanted to be the guy to get that win?
Marini With COVID, we honestly took just took a one week at a time approach, so probably not until about the third quarter. It had nothing to do with the doubt of my kids. I totally believe my kids, we just never set it as a goal. We just said let’s go out and be the best we can be because this is a pandemic and we have very little control. Let’s just be the best we can be every week. Control the controllables. So when we finally got to Vista PEAK week, it was just be great this week. We’re not going to change anything. Let’s just do what we do, make plays and see what happens.
Q: What did you see from your guys that you expected and what did you see from them that surprised you?
Marini What I absolutely expected with this team is resilience. This team has been through so much stuff with losing a teammate, our starting d-end’s house burned down last summer. There have been a million reasons to quit and the kids haven’t quit. I wasn’t surprised when we got down early, a couple of people started to panic, and I just looked at the kids, the mature leaders and told them to relax and do us.
What surprised me is that we’re under-sized. That was a huge team for us to play. I’m always a little surprised with how physical we can be. We coach them to be physical, but when you don’t weigh as much as the people across from you, I was just really impressed with how our defense stepped up physically and really stood up to the best freaking rushing offense in the state.
Q: How much can a win like this reaffirm to your players that they can do anything they want to in life, not necessarily just on the football field?
Marini That’s been the message of our program since I took over. Football is awesome and I want them all to play college football, but in the end, I want you all to be able to fight in life and do whatever it takes in life to be successful. I feel like our program is getting across better and better these days.
Q: You have a bye week this week and then you’ll have that condensed playoff, how do you maintain that one week at a time mentality and also push your guys to strive for this greatness that can be ahead of them the next couple of weeks?
Marini The biggest thing for us is just to identify why we’ve been successful. That’s the key. When you have success, sometimes you just sort of just kind of float along, but you really have to point out to the kids, whether it’s in a film session, whether it’s in practice, whether it’s just talking about their attitudes and lives, why we’re at this moment and to keep replicating that and keep believing in what’s gotten us to this point. I think that’s the key and we’ve been a team that said from the beginning we have to focus on our strengths.
We’re not Cherry Creek, we don’t have everybody huge, big and fast, but we’ve got some big strengths and we really play to those strengths.
Q: In such an unpredictable year, what are you going to remember the most about what you’ve been through with these kids this season?
Marini To see a group of kids truly motivated by the loss of a great friend. Being 19 years in DPS, I’ve seen this situation crush kids and crush teams to where they just never recover because it’s such a traumatic event. To see these kids, just that their resilience emotionally and their resilience in life is what I’ll never forget. Our game against Rangeview when we were honoring Davarie at halftime, we were losing and the kids just rallied again. We didn’t even have a halftime meeting. We went out there and they unveiled his mural and we just sort of had a moment and the kids just bounced back again. And that’s how they’ve been since last summer.
Voted upon by coaches around the state. New voters can sign up by emailing bcochi@chsaa.org. These rankings are part of the postseason seeding process.
Class 5A
RK
TEAM
W-L
PTS
PVS
LW
1
Denver South (7)
5-0
63
3
2-0
2
Fort Collins (1)
4-0
52
2
1-0
3
Vista PEAK Prep
4-1
50
1
1-1
4
Boulder
3-0
38
4
1-0
5
Rangeview
2-2
28
5
0-1
6
Far Northeast
2-2
26
6
1-1
7
Westminster
3-2
18
7
2-0
8
Denver East
1-4
5
8
1-1
Others receiving votes:
Mountain Range 4, Adams City 2, Northglenn 2
Dropped out
Class 4A
RK
TEAM
W-L
PTS
PVS
LW
1
Thomas Jefferson (4)
4-0
39
1
1-0
2
Harrison
5-0
32
2
2-0
3
Falcon
4-1
30
3
2-0
4
George Washington (1)
4-0
28
4
2-0
5
Kennedy
3-2
17
5
1-1
6
Centaurus
3-2
13
6
1-1
7
Aurora Central
3-2
11
7
2-0
8
Gateway
2-3
10
8
0-2
Others receiving votes:
None
Dropped out
Class 3A
RK
TEAM
W-L
PTS
PVS
LW
1
Glenwood Springs (7)
5-0
77
2
2-0
2
The Classical Academy (3)
4-0
63
1
2-0
3
Basalt
4-1
62
3
1-1
4
Rifle
3-2
49
4
1-1
5
The Academy
4-1
40
5
1-1
6
Sand Creek
4-1
30
6
2-0
7
Northfield
3-2
11
–
2-0
8
Aspen
2-3
10
7
1-1
Others receiving votes:
Coal Ridge 7, Montezuma-Cortez 4, Denver West 4, Faith Christian 3
AURORA — Twice in the course of four quarters, Denver South quarterback Julian Buerk limped off the field in obvious pain. The first time, the Ravens were still losing so after taking a series off he went back out there.
The second time, the Ravens had just taken the lead in the fourth quarter and he turned the burden over to the defense. His two touchdown passes and the defense’s ability to shut down the run game was the perfect formula for Class 5A No. 3 Denver South to come away with an 18-15 win over No. 1 Vista PEAK Prep on Saturday.
Sacrificing body and all was worth it for the senior quarterback after he had commanded the team to two 4-6 seasons in the years prior.
“You have to do what you have to do to win,” Buerk said. “I came out to play and this was all for the team.”
The team had to battle from behind early. The Bison (4-1 overall, 3-1 5A South) got on the board early thanks to a long touchdown run from Ja’derris Carr. A swinging gate formation on the point after allowed for an easy 2-point conversion to give them an 8-0 lead.
The Ravens (5-0, 4-0) knew they had to adjust their defense to focus on the run game and Buerk knew he had to get his team down the field. He wasn’t afraid to air the ball out and chipped away yardage to get into the red zone in the second quarter.
(Dan Mohrmann/CHSAANow.com)
Buerk found Jake Perruccio over the middle and the sophomore stretched his way into the end zone. Buerk was then stopped less than a yard shy of the goal line on the 2-point conversion, allowing the Bison to maintain a two-point lead at halftime.
The defenses clamped down and neither team scored in the third quarter. With time running out and his ankle obviously causing him discomfort, Buerk mustered up another drive into the Vista PEAK red zone. This time it was Rashad Caldwell on the catch and he kept his legs churning until he could reach the ball over the goal line to put the Ravens up 12-8.
“We know we have one of the best passing games in the state, fall or spring,” South coach Ryan Marini said. “If we can protect him, we know that Julian will take over a game the way he did. Our receivers know to get open because he’ll find them.”
A pick-six from Yohannes Antonio put the game out of reach, although the Bison did score a late touchdown to pull to within a field goal. An injury to Carr late in the game just added to Vista PEAK’s troubles throughout the day. Turnovers and costly penalties stalled drives at the most inopportune times. It’s a lesson the Bison are sure to hang on to moving forward.
“We’ve had similar penalties but those didn’t cost us a game,” Bison coach John Sullivan said. “It finally did. But Denver South played a great game today. They came in with a plan for stopping our run and we’ll get better. We’ll learn from it.”
For at least the weekend, Denver South with ride the wave of energy with the win. Marini was quick to point out that this senior class won a futures championship as eighth graders and a win over a team like Vista PEAK is something that players and coaches alike know can add energy to a program.
“It’s the biggest win we could’ve gotten,” Buerk said.
Now they want to aim for a bigger one as they look to make a championship run in the next month.
