Feelings

Gage Kyler called it a reminder to keep playing hard. Caden Keplinger said it was a wake-up call. And manager Pat Taylor labeled it as blessing. No matter how they look at it, the Conococheague 11-12 All-Stars got something they admit they probably sorely needed on July 24 in their first game at the Maryland state tournament. It was a loss - a 4-2 defeat at the hands of Northern Calvert. That slip set the stage for everything Conococheague has now. It fought through the losers' bracket to win the Maryland state title for the right to represent the state in the Mid-Atlantic Regional and a shot at the Little League World Series.

Sir Isaac Newton’s third law of motion states, in its most simple terms, that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Occasionally, the same could be said for the administration of justice, because in some cases it leads to an equal injustice. Friday night, the Sharpsburg Little League 9-10 All-Star team won its opening game in the District 1 tournament, beating Conococheague, 13-11. However, before the game had ended, Conococheague officials filed a protest, claiming a player on the Sharpsburg roster did not live within that league’s boundaries.

Best friends Lauren Matthews and Danielle Dietz fussed nervously with their caps and gowns Friday night before walking into Trojan Stadium and facing the reality that their days at Chambersburg Area Senior High School were coming to an end. "I'm excited and nervous," said Matthews, 18, who plans to attend Penn State Mont Alto in the fall. "I'm kind of ready (to move on) and then I'm kind of not. It's going to be a really big change. We're going out into the real world now and that's going to be, like, overwhelming, kind of. " "I keep telling my dad that I'm not ready to grow up. I still want to be a little kid," said Dietz, 18, who also will attend Penn State Mont Alto.

Unperturbed by a written test that included words like "vitelline" and "hukilau," local speller Tyler Reese said he finished day one of the Scripps National Spelling Bee feeling "pretty good" about his chances of advancing to the bee's semifinals. "I think I did very well," Tyler, 14, of Greencastle, Pa., said by phone after the test. An eighth-grader at Heritage Academy in Hagerstown, Tyler was this year's Washington County Spelling Bee champion and is being sponsored at the national bee by The Herald-Mail.

Eastern Panhandle leaders believe that growth in the coming decade won’t be as strong as in the last 10 years, when the region’s population gained 42,620 residents to reach 175,208. In the decade ending in 2010, Berkeley County Schools’ student population grew to about 18,000 students in 29 school buildings. “That’s enough growth to take in the entire Ohio County, W.Va., student population,” Superintendent Manny Arvon said. Ohio County, home to Wheeling, is the 19th-largest school district in the state.

It might not be too much of an exaggeration to place Bryce Harper’s name on a list with Paul Bunyan and Daniel Boone. The 18-year-old doesn’t have a blue ox or a coonskin cap as a trademark, just a bat. Still, Harper’s amateur career is legendary. Harper has had an ability to play up to the level of older players and outperform them. He was more than a blip on the major league radar by the time he reached his early teens. It all led to the Washington Nationals making the phenom the first overall selection of the 2010 amateur draft.

Jill and Kelly Colbert are practicing for when they become grandparents. For seven years, the Colberts have “adopted” a young man or two and given them all the comforts of home while spoiling and caring for them. Then, in September, the Colberts send them home to their parents and keep the fond memories for themselves. In a sense, the Colberts are summer foster parents. They open their home annually as a Hagerstown Suns host family for the season. The Colberts’ hospitality gives players an alternative to a short-term apartment lease from April to September, while providing shelter and meals, fellowship and encouragement during their six-month stay in Hagerstown.

Senior citizens at the Southeastern senior nutrition site in Keedysville say they’re being put on the shelf by the Washington County Commission on Aging’s recent decision to reduce the center’s operations from five days a week to three. “We used to come every day. Now we come Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays,” Anna Lee Burker, 84, said during a recent gathering at the nutrition site. The decision “really upset me,” she said. “I’ve been coming here for 20 1/2 years.

It might not be Yankees-Red Sox or Celtics-Lakers or Ravens-Steelers, but when it comes to local track and field, Gussio-Patterson is as good as rivalries get. The two record-breaking seniors — Boonsboro’s Coby Gussio and Catoctin’s Deven Patterson — can flat-out fly. “He’s a hell of an athlete,” Gussio said Saturday after completing his fourth and final event at the Maryland Class 1A West region indoor...