Daly grind puts scoring records within reach
ERIK ERLENDSSON Tampa Tribune correspondent
Click here for my take on scoring records -- J.R.
TAMPA - Rob Daly already is a record-breaking goal scorer for Jesuit and has his sights set on county and state records.
Rob Daly's season has been marked by frustration.
It seems the Jesuit senior forward has been doing his job too well and is scoring goals at a record-setting pace. Unfortunately for Daly, that means his game time gets reduced and he has been lucky to get in more than a 40 minutes on the field.
``There have times this year where he has spent more time in warm-ups than he has on the field,'' Jesuit coach Bob Bauman said. ``I know he wants to keep playing, but it gets to a point sometimes where you ask what good does it do to keep him in there.''
In the Tigers' first 10 games, Daly has a Hillsborough County-leading 23 goals. But he has played an entire game only four times, three of which were in the Sarasota Tournament last month. Bauman typically takes Daly out if the score gets out of hand, which it has at various times this year.
After a game with Leto tonight, Daly will get a chance to test his skills Saturday against Loyola (Calif.) Jesuit and Houston (Texas) Jesuit, each a state champion in their respective states. The Tigers will play a doubleheader today at 4, with games against each out-of-state team.
Daly, already the school career leader in goals scored (68), is on a pace for 50 this season, which would shatter the Hillsborough County record, believed to be 36 by Chamberlain's Juan Panesso in 1992. Daly will also break Shea Helmle's school record of 29 goals, set last season.
``It would be great to get to 50, but as long as the team in winning then I am happy,'' Daly said.
Daly also said he would like to challenge Sebastian Janikowski's state career record of 69, which the FSU kicker set as a senior at Daytona Beach Seabreeze.
Though Janikowski's record is within reach, it is unlikely Daly would get the opportunity to attain it because of the reduction of his playing time.
How dominant has Daly been this year in his limited playing time?
In the Sarasota tournament he scored all four Jesuit goals in a 4-1 win against Bradenton Southeast and two goals in the tournament final against Bradenton Manatee. In an 11-0 win against Robinson on Dec. 3 Daly played 12 minutes, took five shots and scored five goals. Only twice this year - against Jenkins and Berkeley Prep - has Daly failed to score a goal.
``He has scored against teams of every caliber,'' Bauman said. ``He scored both goals in the state championship game last year and scored in the state final as a sophomore. He lights it up against any kind of competition. I wouldn't want anyone to belittle his performance by saying it has come against weaker teams.''
Bauman said he has been torn between allowing Daly to get the the playing time he needs to remain on top of his game and pulling him to do what is right.
``It's been tough because you don't want to run up the score,'' Bauman said. ``But at the same time, teams have been packing [the penalty box] to try and shut him down and he is still scoring.''
©1999 Tampa Tribune
A slight correction on this article: 68 is not a career scoring record; it is perhaps a single-season record.
I know that Kevin Alvero had 66 goals in one season (1993) for Dunedin, which is the Pinellas County record; and, I recall that he was one shy of the state record held by Chris Crashaw of Mulberry (67). It's possible Janikowski broke the record in his senior year at Seabreeze. (1996?)
By the way, St. Petersburg's Johnny Oldja, who graduated last year, had 50+ goals in both his junior and senior years. I do not know his career total. According to my research, the following are the state career scoring records:
Winter soccer:
Fall soccer:
Of course, as Erik rightly points out in the article, the whole idea of scoring records is moot. The best teams are going to blow out the weaker teams, and any respectable coach is not going to leave his best players in the game. Thus, anyone who wins a scoring title has a coach who likes to beat up on weak teams.
Jeremy R.