By Neill Kirkpatrick Special to the HSSR Mt. Pleasant – The 2025 spring sports season was a solid one for the Palmetto Christian Eagles while the records might not reflect that, the interest, participation, and enthusiasm surrounding the athletic programs has Athletic Director Dan Hoover excited for the future. “It has been exciting to see our student/athletes and coaches putting together good seasons. It shows how our programs are growing and getting better. I expect us to give great effort and to compete at a high level as we continue to grow as an athletic program. It is all about getting to the heart behind the jersey and our coaches do a great job of getting the most from our athletes,” said coach. Coach Hoover, besides his athletic director duties he is also the boys and girls head track and field coach. Both his teams are young but preformed well at the state meet and will just get better each year. The boys team brought home the only medals and they were expected. Senior Sam Smith won gold again in the pole vault with a vault of 4.11 meters it was below his personal best of 4.47. Fellow senior Gavin Wease won bronze with a vault of 3.81 meters. He won silver last year at the state meet. He has a personal best of 4.27 meters. “I expected Sam and Gavin to have a good meet. They were ranked one and two all year in the pole vault,” said coach Hoover. Eighth grader Davis Padgett finished fifth in the Javelin with a throw of 41.78 meters.. He has a personal best of 42.98 meters. He currently ranks second in the state among 8th grade boys for Javelin. Sixth grader Evelyn Mercer was the top finisher on the girls side as she placed fourth in the 3200 meters. She was 11 th in the 1600 meters. On the diamond the baseball team was one of the teams that took some lumps but it was a young team and they continued to improve all year. They were led by Ryan Delaney who hit over .300 as did Brayden Doster. On the bump, Jake Taylor led the pitching staff. On the pitch, the girls team was led by seniors Bria Olson , junior Addison Surratt and sophomore Juliet Olson. Olson and Surratt tied for the team lead in goals with 10 and were first and second in points with 24 and 20, respectively. The Eagle golf finished 13 th at the state meet but they improved their score from last season. Jack Semeraro shot 77-83-160 which was a seven-stroke improvement from last year while Eli Batzig finished 88-88-176.

 By Neill Kirkpatrick Special to the HSSR Mt. Pleasant – The Palmetto Christian Academy Eagles track and field teams has finished in the top ten at the SCISA division II state meet last year and the program continues to improve and is getting larger as a number of young kids have joined the program. Because of the youth on the team head coach Dale Hoover’s expectations are a bit tapered but his program has always been more working to get the most out of his team while developing their confidence that they can get better through hard work. “There is always a fine line between expecting too much from athletes and pushing them to be their best and with the youth of our team, my goal for this season is to develop the competitive desire within our athletes while tempering expectations to make sure they don't feel defeated if they fall short,” said coach Hoover. Coach continued, “I see this year as building for our future and that approach allows me to celebrate what we have instead of focusing on how young we are. As in past years, these kids continue to impress me with their work ethic and strong character. They genuinely cheer for each other and that continues to make coaching here a lot of fun for me.” Another thing that has been exciting for coach Hoover has been the addition of one his former athletes to his coaching staff in Lauren Pernell. She along Chris Mercer coach the distance runners. The Eagles return the top two pole vaulter s in SCISA in seniors Sam Smith and Gavin Wease. Smith set a new SCISA pole vault record last season at the state meet with a vault of 14’8” while Wease finished second with a vault of `14’. They both recently competed in the All-American Track classic where Smith finished fifth and Wease finished 16 th . The distance events are where the strength of the Eagles boys’ team and they return several key runners in juniors Trey Wilson, freshmen Alex Avinger and Heyward Neely and seventh grader Lucas Rodriguez-Porcel. Avinger is the top returner having run in the state meet last season finishing in the top 15 in both the 800 and 1600 meters while Neely ran in the 1600- and 3200-meters finishing 12 th and 8 th respectively. Seventh grader Jackson Pollard has a bright future in the sprints and has run a 13.47 while eighth grader Davis Padgett has improved tremendously and currently ranks second in the state among 8th grade boys for Javelin. Junior Josie Hurley placed second in the 1600 and third in the 800 at last year’s state meet and is the leaders of the girls team. She has a personal best of 2:32.8 in the 800 and 5:47.69 in the 1600. Our fastest distance runner has been 6th grader Evelyn Mercer , who has broken our school records for the 3200 and 1600 this year. She is currently ranked #2 in the nation among 6th grade girls and 6th in the nation for the 1600. Sophomore Sydney Geiger has been the leader in the field events in the long and triple jumps. She also runs the 100, 100 hurdles and 200 meters. Also returning to the girls team in the distance events are freshmen Caton Newbern and seventh graders Elizabeth Craft and Blakely Cole and in the sprints are sophomore Teagan Delaney, freshmen Anna Grace Works and eighth grader Lola Perry.