Guardian Angel Academy sports teams are off to a successful start, with four fall sports in full swing. Following a busy summer of rostering teams, lining up coaches, getting uniforms and equipment, coordinating practice schedules, and all kinds of other planning, we are off and running (often literally), and it has been awesome to see our kids in action, many of them multi-sport athletes giving their best to each of their sports. Fall sports pictures will be coming up soon, so families stay tuned for information from your coaches on dates and times for those. A full sports calendar for our school website is also in the works and should be up soon.

We have had record turnout for our Girls Volleyball teams, with so many girls signed up that we are fielding two Varsity teams (the Gold Team and the Black Team), as well as a full JV team that contains a number of 4th graders adding to their ranks and getting excellent instruction at practice and game time during JV games so they can perfect their skills as novice volleyball players. Our coaches have reported excellent team spirit among the girls, and great leadership by the Varsity teams for all of the younger girls on JV. All our teams are playing in a very competitive section, and have had one set of home games already and several contests on the road. The girls have a full schedule ahead, with upcoming games against Holy Cross, Mother of Mercy, and South Hills Catholic Academy.

Turnout has also been super for soccer. We are fielding 6 teams in the Diocesan League this year, with First, Second, Third, and Fourth grades each with a team, as well as full JV and Varsity teams. All of our teams will play a full 8 game schedule this fall, with 4 home and 4 away games. Our JV and Varsity teams made their game debut two weeks ago away at Archangel Gabriel, and our Developmental Teams played their first games last weekend at home. JV and Varsity play this weekend at St. Paul Seminary at 11:30 and 12:45 respectively.

Pee Wee Soccer is also underway for Pre-K and Kindergarten students, with a nice turnout among the younger kids, so they can get together as a team and learn soccer fundamentals before the graduate to the First Grade team and competitive play.

Cross Country is about three weeks into its season, and the team of 68 runners from Kindergarten through 8th grade has run in the Blessed Trinity Invitational, hosted a home meet, and ran in 3 additional meets so far, with about five weeks of the season left before Diocesan Championships on October 23. Individual shout outs to Macie Trombetta, Maria Leithauser, Mason Foster, and Averie Strohm for medaling at the very competitive Blessed Trinity Invitational with 16 teams competing. We have had great team success at our meets as well, typically running against 4 or 5 other schools, with full rosters of Developmental Boys, Developmental Girls, JV Boys, JV Girls, Varsity Boys, and Varsity Girls representing Guardian Angel, and in many instances winning the meets based on scoring, with our best showings thus far by Varsity Girls (two wins) and JV Girls (two wins), and a number of very close (2nd place) finishes for our JV Boys and our Varsity Boys.

Guardian Angel Academy also has a number of boys from 3rd grade through 8th grade playing football on the combined Diocesan team the South Hills Chargers, as well as girls from Guardian Angel cheering on the cheer squad for the Chargers. They are off to a successful start of their season, and expected to have a strong year. JV is 1-1 for the season, with its first win in a Diocesan game 14-7 against the North Catholic Ironmen. They lost their second game 40-6 against Erie McDowell, a PA football powerhouse program, with the only touchdown coming from Mason Dick. The Developmental and Varsity teams are each 0-2, but continue to work hard and improve each week.