September 3 - The magazine has established an 18-member selection committee consisting of current and former high school coaches who will select the All-Time Northern Virginia Top 10 from a list of 60 nominees.
The committee is a who’s who of current and previous generations of local prep baseball, with the coaches having won a combined 13 state championships. Six members of the committee have over 350 career victories to their name, and two - Ron Tugwell and Mike Covington - have over 400.
In addition to Tugwell, the longtime former West Springfield coach who won 431 career games and two state championships, and Covington, the longtime Potomac skipper who has won 402 games entering the 2017 season, the committee includes the following members of the 350+ club: former Oakton coach Tom Hall (385), current Madison coach Mark ‘Pudge’ Gjormand (375), who has won two state titles, former Westfield coach Chuck Welch (368), and Wayne Todd, who led Broad Run to a title in 1992 and Loudoun Valley to a title in 2014.
The committee will also include: Doug Grove, who has won 271 games at Washington-Lee; Sam Plank, who has won 256 games at Stone Bridge and Riverside and won a state title in 2015 with the Bulldogs; Scott Rowland, who skippered Flint Hill, South Lakes and Oakton to 256 wins and won a state title with the Cougars in 2000; and Billy Emerson, who has accumulated the majority of his 240 victories at Paul VI Catholic, which he has led to four Virginia Independent Schools Athletic Association (VISAA) state titles.
Longtime former Lake Braddock coach Dan Griel, who led the Bruins to over 200 wins and three state championship game appearances, as well as Tony Labozzetta, who led Gar-Field to the Group AAA state title in 1992, and Kevin Ford, who led Chantilly to the 6A state title this past spring, also join the committee. Three Robinson coaches - former skippers Tom Peterson and Bill Evers, and current coach John James - will also participate, as well as longtime Hayfield coach Ron Simms and Jimmy Linza, the former Mount Vernon and Hayfield coach who has spent countless hours chronicling the history of local high school baseball and has played a key role in recapping our nominees dating back to 1932.
Recaps of nominees from the 1970s and prior to 1970 will be released in the coming days, and the selection committee will be sent the poll next week. The All-Time Northern Virginia Top 10 will be released beginning with the No. 10 team at the end of next week.
Pictured above from left: Madison's Mark 'Pudge' Gjormand, Loudoun Valley's Wayne Todd, former Oakton coach Scott Rowland, Potomac's Mike Covington, and Washington-Lee's Doug Grove.
