Eleanor Roosevelt High School’s fall sports teams completed their respective seasons recently. Although no team won a state championship this year, their was plenty of success to be found throughout each sport.

Cross Country

The Raiders once again had a successful season running on courses around the state. Both teams won the PG county championship respectively, with the boys’ team also finishing 1st in the 4A South region championship. The girls’ team a finished a close 2nd behind Bowie. Both teams qualified for states, where they competed on the 3rd hardest running course in the country. The boys finished 13th overall as a team and the girls finished 19th overall in their division. Senior, Tim Crane said “overall the season was a success. We did not meet our goals at states in terms of our final places, which was disappointing, but I think that is just because we set our own goals so high in order to push ourselves.”  Crane said that “there is a lot of young talent and optimism on both sides,” which will bode well for next year.

Volleyball

The girls volleyball team finished their season with a final overall record of 10-5. The team ended up losing in the 2nd round of playoffs to Flowers. Although the team did not get as far as they hoped it was still a good season according to sophomore, Lydia Jones. Jones stated, “I think this season was a growing year because we had a lot of younger players that were new to the varsity level but, later in the season we truly came together.” She believes that “next year [the team] will definitely be more prepared and be ready to reclaim the county championship title.”

Cheerleading

The varsity cheerleading team spent most of the fall season cheering at football games and preparing for the upcoming competition season. They also performed in the Greenbelt Labor Day parade. Junior, Alexis Holliday stated that the team “conditions a lot and has been spending a lot of time working on difficult stunts.” The team practices 3 days a week and is currently working on their routine for their first competition, which will be on January 9th.

Soccer

The girls’ soccer team finished their respective season once again as a dominant force in the county, going undefeated and winning the county championship against Parkdale. After an unexpected change in their bracket for playoffs, the Raiders were faced with two new schools being placed in their region, North Point and Leonardtown. The Raiders put up a good fight but ended up falling to North Point in the second round. Freshman, Amina Bejja thought “our season this year went great. It could have been better, but I think as a team we worked really hard and played together nicely.”  She also added that she “can not wait for the next season.”

The boys’ soccer team had one of it’s most successful seasons ever in Coach George Kallas’ 31 years while leading the team. The team finished the season with a record of 15-2-2, winning the county championship 5-0 against Duval and then beating Parkdale 3-2 in the regional championship game. The team then advanced to the state semifinals where they lost to Perry Hall 1-0 in a close game. Senior, Amgad Kamil said that “the soccer season was phenomenal. We had solid team chemistry, overcame struggles, made improbable comebacks, and pushed through to come out on top as county and regional champions.” He believes that the team “represented PG county well in the state semifinals” and that it was “unfortunate that they could not finish on top.”

Football

After losing last year to Duval in the 4A South regional final and graduating 35 seniors, the Raiders were not expected to accomplish much this season. But they proved everyone wrong, finishing the season with a record of 9-3 and returned to the regional final against Wise. The team gave Wise one of it’s toughest games of the season, at one point leading 14-13 in the second half, but fell short, with their season ending in a 33-14 loss. Junior, Karl Mofor stated that the “season went well” considering that they proved a lot of doubters wrong. As for next year, the “goal is to win a state championship and leave Roosevelt with an unforgettable season,” said Mofor.