The 2023-2024 athletic year brought many milestones and memorable moments highlighted by hockey and soccer winning championship titles on the same night. 

If you’re a Friar fan, your calendar was booked on March 2nd. In addition to the championship games, Servite also honored Hall of Famer and 16-year NFL veteran Matthew Slater ‘03 at the annual Excellence in Leadership Dinner held the same evening at the JW Marriott. Needless to say, it was a great day to be a Friar! 

Hockey got the action started, advancing to the Anaheim Ducks High School Hockey League (ADHSHL) Commissioner’s Cup finals after posting a regular season record of 19-1 overall and defeating Corona Norco 3-2 in shootouts to win the Ridge Conference title. The Friars went on to defeat Los Alamitos 3-1 at Great Park Ice to raise the Cup for the third time since 2020. Senior Giovanni Capraro scored two goals in the contest including the game winner then was later recognized as the ADHSHL Offensive Player of the Year and Servite’s Athlete of the Year, becoming the first hockey player in school history to earn the recognition. 

Kicking off just an hour later, soccer took on Trinity League rival Orange Lutheran at Orange Coast College in a rematch of the CIF-SS D1 championship game that was played just one week earlier, where the Friars defeated the Lancers 3-1 in front of a packed crowd at Fred Kelly Stadium. History repeated itself as soccer once again came away victorious, this time topping Orange Lutheran 1-0 to win just the second CIF State Regional Championship in program history. The game’s lone goal was scored by junior Mattias Kremer in the 12th minute while senior goalkeeper Talin Morgan earned the shutout. The team went on to finish No. 6 in the nation and No. 1 in California, led in part by senior captain Justin Cuevas who was recognized CIF Player of the Year and the recipient of Servite’s Sherer Courage Award after missing his entire junior campaign due to injury. 

Football also earned the opportunity to play for a CIF-SS Championship in the fall as first-year Head Coach Chris Reinert ‘04 led the team to a finals berth after earning key wins over Long Beach Poly and Gardena Serra during their playoff run. 

The title chase didn’t end there as golf returned to the top of the Trinity League standings, finishing league play 9-1 to clinch their first title since 2019. Sophomore Hanks Wang won the Individual Trinity League Tournament becoming the 4th straight Servite golfer to accomplish the feat. In doing so, he set a new league record shooting 130 over the two-day tournament at Los Serranos Country Club, coming in at an impressive 14 under.

Wrestlers Josh Valdez ‘24 (144), Mitchell Semaan ‘25 (190) and Adam Galindo ‘25 (215) brought home some hardware of their own winning individual Trinity League medals in their respective weight classes while track athletes Quaid Carr ‘25 and Camren Hughes ‘26 also took their rightful place at the top of the podium after winning the 100 and 200 respectively at Trinity League Finals. In addition, Carr and Hughes were members of the 4x100 relay team that took 1st place at both league finals and the OC Championships, breaking the school record from 2017 not once, but twice this season. 

As the year came to a close, 17 members of the Class of 2024 signed to continue their athletic careers at four-year universities including 3x All-CIF selection and All-American Eamon Rigdon who is headed to USC to play volleyball and 4x All-Trinity League tennis player and 2x doubles champion Chris Marci who has signed with Azusa Pacific University. Football led all programs with six signees followed by baseball and soccer with four each. 

With so many great memories and accomplishments now in the rear view, we won’t have to wait long to see what the 2024-2025 athletic year has in store. Football kicks off once again August 23rd at OCC to get the fall season going!