Thanks to our continued partnership with Univest Financial, SuburbanOneSports.com will once again recognize a male and female featured athlete each week. The recognition is given to seniors of high character who are students in good standing that have made significant contributions to their teams or who have overcome adversity. Selections are based on nominations received from coaches, athletic directors and administrators.
Univest’s SuburbanOneSports.com Featured Female Athlete (Week of Feb. 14, 2024)
On her family’s 7 1/2 -acre farm in Plumstead Township in Bucks County, Isabella Carter’s family is home to multiple animals – from dogs to donkeys to chickens to goats to sheep to alpacas and fish. There is even a mule. Add a self-described shark, at least figuratively. “Yes,” she confirmed. “(A shark is) someone who is hungry in the sense that they know what they want and will go after it. In life, things aren’t going to be handed to you on a silver platter.” This predator mentality made Carter the perfect trailblazer as the first girl to lace up skates and play ice hockey for Central Bucks West, and she is now counting on being a role model for others but cautions that perseverance is needed. “I’m hopeful that other girls will follow and feel comfortable following whatever sport they want,” said the senior defender. “I also know that it’s not easy. I am always the first on the ice at every practice. I have to be. I know I need to work harder than the boys and that you can’t take anything for granted. What they don’t see is the hours and hours I spend each week in our barn shooting pucks, practicing; but I love this game and I expect to be playing for a long time just like my dad.”
Carter watched her dad, Joe, play hockey in their native New Jersey and was immediately in love with the game. Playing at the highest possible level, which meant against boys, was the immediate goal. Her first experience playing against boys was on a house team at Winding River Rink in Toms River, located in her native Ocean County, N.J. She also captained a 14U girls’ team – the Tiger Lilies – in Princeton, N.J. The Carters then moved to Bucks County, setting up shop at Stone Cellar Farm in April of 2020 (in the midst of COVID). She started playing with the Lady Patriots as a freshman in high school, not even aware that her new school, CB West, had what is ostensibly a boys’ team. Once she knew about it, well, there was no keeping the farm girl down on the farm.
She came out for the team determined to make it work. While the West coaching staff now can’t imagine life without Carter, there was definitely a feeling-out process. “They didn’t really know what to do with me,” said Carter. “I asked a lot of questions. I like to know how things work, and I don’t think they were expecting me to learn as much as I learned. I would be on the ice 30 minutes beforehand, working on all the stuff we did in practice the week before. I just wanted to make sure that I had it down.” If first impressions mean anything, longtime CB West coach Dave Baun immediately put aside any apprehension of having a girl on the team. Even if his team cut players, she would have made the team. “It’s true,” said Baun. “It wasn’t a case where we took her because we needed someone. We took her because she could play.” As such, she was no longer Isabella. She was “Carter” to the coaches, as they like to call all the players by their surnames.
Initially, Carter’s male teammates saw her as an oddity. “I didn’t want to be treated any differently,” said Carter. “It’s gotten better. Some of them didn’t know how to talk to a girl at first, honestly, but I have showed them how to talk to a girl. It worked out. I’m just like them. I’m one of the guys.” The big moment for her often comes after games. “They are surprised when I take off my helmet and I have all my luscious locks underneath,” she said with a laugh. What has impressed Baun the most is Carter’s steady improvement. “She has earned her time,” he said. “She didn’t play much when she was a sophomore, but the difference in the quality of her game, between junior year and senior year, has been pretty remarkable. She learned defensive technique. She plays angles well. She gaps up well. She learns the sequence of puck retrievals. These are the things that not everyone in the league does, but she does those things well. She can compensate for the fact that she is a little lighter than some of the other kids. She compensates for it because she’s smart. She plays smart.”
While there have been other options, Carter plans to attend Penn State’s main campus and play club hockey. It’s a matter of keeping her priorities in order. “I went to Penn State for a visit, and I really enjoyed it,” she said. “I am going for animal science to later become a veterinarian. I had a lot of offers from D2 and D3 schools. I care about my education though, so I’m going to pursue that.” Carter takes an AP-heavy curriculum and maintains a 3.7 GPA and is in the National Honor Society, where her volunteer hours are spent coaching for the Lady Patriots and for the middle school team. “I have no free time, but that’s OK,” said Carter, who is a versatile player on the CB West lacrosse team. “I don’t really need it. I don’t like to sit around and be a bum on the couch. I like to be moving around.”
To read Carter’s complete story, please click on the following link: https://suburbanonesports.com/featured-athletes/female/isabella-carter-00111122
Univest’s SuburbanOneSports.com Featured Male Athlete (Week of Feb. 14, 2024)
Basketball is more than just a sport to Clinton Kikonjo. It's his undeniable passion, and it opened up a whole new world to the Souderton senior when he transferred from Northeast High School in Philadelphia to Souderton in the fall of 2022. “I still remember – it was Oct. 14,” Kikonjo said. “I was sitting at lunch by myself, and Mr. Stanton, who’s always in the lunchroom, came up to me, and he introduced me to Chanse (Salone).” Without fanfare and with one simple introduction, Dennis Stanton, Souderton’s athletic director, and Salone, then a freshman on the basketball team, completely changed the trajectory of Kikonjo’s entire high school experience. That lunchroom encounter not only marked the beginning of his career on the court with Souderton but also – although unbeknownst to him at the time - gave him a basketball ‘family’ that eased his transition into a new world. “Souderton basketball made me have a lot of connections with new people,” Kikonjo said. “If I weren’t playing basketball, I’d probably still be the quiet kid sitting by himself at lunch not knowing anybody. That really jumpstarted my high school experience at Souderton.”
Granted, Kikonjo’s journey had its peaks and valleys, and it was one of those valleys that turned out to be a defining moment in Kikonjo’s basketball career. “Clinton started out on the varsity, and we had a pretty tight rotation of seven guys, so he wasn’t getting a lot of playing time,” Souderton coach Okoteh Sackitey said. “I just thought he needed to develop a little more to have significant, consistent, positive contributions on the court. I wanted him to play, I wanted him to get better, and I thought that would be best for him to get more minutes on the court that I couldn’t provide to him at the time on the varsity level, so in the middle of the season, I asked him if he would be willing to play JV as well. When we had tryouts and made cuts, he was varsity only, so that’s a tough situation, it’s a blow to the ego for anyone, especially for a high school kid asking him to play with the JV.”
It was a difficult conversation for both coach and player. “It’s not something you really want to hear after coming from a school where you played varsity basketball,” Kikonjo said. “It’s hard to explain. Transferring to another school – you have to build up your role like the other guys did. I understood where he was coming from as a coach. I’m glad he gave me that opportunity because if I was just to stay on varsity and not play any basketball – what is all this for? So, I’m glad he moved me down to JV for a bit because it really helped my confidence type of thing. Trying to find my confidence in a new school was hard, and that really helped a lot.” Kikonjo’s stay on JV was brief. “He started on jayvee and got a lot of minutes,” Sackitey said. “He played very well, and once I saw him playing so well, he started to earn varsity minutes. I saw him taking strides on the court with JV and I got more comfortable giving him minutes on varsity, and he got more comfortable playing on the floor with varsity.” Fast forward to Kikonjo’s senior year when he was a fixture in the starting lineup and a key contributor. “I’m really proud of how far he’s come from having that conversation with him his junior year and saying – I think the best thing for your growth is to go and play JV – and from that to starting every single game for us this year and doing the things that he did – I’m just so proud of him,” Sackitey said.
Kikonjo was able to score from both inside and outside, but his contributions didn’t end there. “He did a good job rebounding, defending bigs,” Sackitey said. “He led the team in charges taken. He did all the little things- he set good screens, he passed well. When we needed an extra ball handler, he did a great job handling the ball. He just was a total team player and had some of the biggest shots. His demeanor is so calm, cool and collected. He also did a great job putting games on ice for us, knocking down free throws in late-game situations. He’s definitely had some real big moments for us and did a lot of good things.”
Kikonjo is looking to follow in his brother’s footsteps and attend Montgomery County Community College where he plans to major in sports marketing to combine his love of sports with a career. He is hoping to continue his basketball career at the next level. As he comes down the home stretch of his final year of high school, Kikonjo is not just a member of the Souderton basketball family but also his high school community. “I see him in the hallway comfortable with people,” Sackitey said. “I’m happy to see him happy, not just on the basketball court. I think you can have more than one home. I see Clinton in the hallway, and it looks like he has made this a home. It looks like he’s found what look like true friends, and I think he has made some true friends on this basketball team. It’s good to see. I’ve got a lot of love for him.”
To read Kikonjo’s complete story, please click on the following link: https://suburbanonesports.com/featured-athletes/male/clinton-kikonjo-00111125
- Log in to post comments
