People in Sports

Sports Editor Emeritus

Email Fredman at fredman@capegazette.com

Like Tambourine Man, all athletes eventually fade...

Dave Frederick
5 months ago
Primetime Cape cousins - Ella Rishko and Mikey Frederick are first cousins. They were the male and...

Travels with Fredman: 44 years as a people in sports...

Dave Frederick
5 months ago
Travels with Fredman - Forty-four years ago, with the sound of typewriter keys pounding out copy as...

Arden MacPhee turns the world on with her smile

Dave Frederick
5 months ago
Posterizing Planet Earth - Arden MacPhee, 13, is a community kid who beat the odds and childhood...

Fans get eerily quiet when outcome is no longer in...

Dave Frederick
5 months ago
Quiet storm - It was a blustery afternoon at Beacon Middle School April 21, for a boys’ lacrosse...

Fifteen-yard stare: fitting two heads in the frame...

Dave Frederick
5 months ago
Fifteen yards away - The lens and camera rig I had required me to stand 15 yards away to get Lee...

Spring season is all about participation across all...

Dave Frederick
5 months ago
Cool Runnings - I snapped a photo of marathon runner Jodi Johnson and thought the 23-year-old out...

Recognizing faces in places, but we all stumble on...

Dave Frederick
5 months ago
Symbolic speech - The Coastal Delaware Running Festival produces a sea of T-shirts with message...

Refs rule the roost, control the venue and are...

Dave Frederick
5 months ago
Max factor - I don’t bash referees, but to claim they aren’t a factor in a game (pick your sport)...

Cone of uncertainty surrounds protected cylinder of...

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
Cone of Uncertainty - There is a cylinder of personal space in basketball, lacrosse, soccer and...

Parched like a Dead Sea scroll on a red devil track

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
Acclimation project - Cape’s red devil track was unrelentingly pizza-oven hot Tuesday afternoon. We...

Coaches carry themselves with confidence and class 

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
LaForce Be With You - Allie LaForce is a sideline reporter for TNT Sports working the NCAA...

Reed Reflections: Fast with class and humble in the...

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
Athletic intelligence and high character - In March 1988, Dr. Chuck Epifanio and I were tracking...

Naiya and Aniyah run middle distance at Sussex...

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
Miss Teen Delmarva - Aniyah Daisey, 15, ran the Run for the Buds 5K March 22, passing me on Fredman...

Chuck and Carol Epifanio: An inseparable team of one 

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
Sail Away on the Wings of a Dove - Dr. Chuck Epifanio was a marine scientist at the UD campus in...

Half-marathon relay runners' combined age is less...

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
Shiny happy people running - Cape’s 4-by-800-meter indoor relay team that placed third in the state...

Moment of Zen on the playing fields of Fred Thomas...

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
Moment of Zen - “First there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is.” – Donovan,...

Lacrosse girls playing basketball, just call them...

Dave Frederick
6 months ago
Happening in the moment - Multisport athletes Ally Diehl, Mairead Rishko, Amara Fruchtman, Mikaela...

Brag sheet of wrestlers includes GPA

Dave Frederick
7 months ago
Brag sheet - Bragging on yourself is considered annoyingly uncool and needy unless someone asked...

AI equals acquired immunity for photographers who...

Dave Frederick
7 months ago
Catch a shooting star - William Penn wrestling coach Joe Archangelo went out with a shazam Saturday...

Athletes are ready to bust loose

7 months ago
Wrestling Immersion Program - The only way to learn the language of a championship state wrestling...

Two days behind the camera, yet I often miss the...

Dave Frederick
7 months ago
What’s going on - Wrestling is the most intense sport; the dual meets are like indoor football...

Sports is a connect-the-dots game; the older you get...

Dave Frederick
7 months ago
Coach of the Year - The Tubby Raymond Delaware Coach of the Year Award, as voted by the Delaware...

‘Stay there’ and ‘short time’ are wrestling commands...

Dave Frederick
7 months ago
Stay there! Stay there! The coach exhorts, “Stay there! Short time!” The wrestler is on top, the...

Bad Bunny and Snoop Dogg are funny names surrounding...

Dave Frederick
7 months ago
Bad Bunny and Snoop Dogg - Where do little melons go in the summertime? John Cougar’s Mellencamp. I...

Young athletes bring magic moments to sports...

Dave Frederick
7 months ago
Sportsmanship and graciousness - I spoke to Lake Forest’s Jerusalem Howard two years ago and just...

Brokaw twins ran and swam for Cape; now they’re...

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Hey, Ricky - Ricky Brokaw was a swimmer and cross country runner at Cape, graduating in 2016. His...

I’m a sportswriter, not a sociologist, but I do have...

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Talk too much - “You talk too much, you worry me to death. You talk too much, you even worry my pet...

Truckin’ Triathlon: Wawa to the bay to the Cape campus

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Blue Ice - Truck Cab Triathlon - There are three venues where I like to park and reflect while...

Track generates numbers, but not much funny happens

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Henlopen track championships - Dover won the boys’ title and Sussex Academy claimed the girls’...

Halfway House of Hope: A sports showcase of promise...

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Halfway house - The Fred Thomas gym is artistically cool, cozy and comfortable, but it doesn’t...

Cape wrestlers place third at Grapple at the Brook 

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Grapple at the Brook - The Cape wrestlers, the traveling people of Viking sports, placed third of...

Swimming in the stream of consciousness, showing up...

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Streaming the scene - Late-afternoon middle school sports is its own scene outside the lines. It's...

Real competition features best on best

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Friars Club - I have a good friend, Chuck Chinici, who used to be the AD at Malvern Prep in Malvern...

Personal bests and milestones in the sports landscape

Dave Frederick
8 months ago
Raven flies high - “Air” Jordan Welch, a Sussex Tech senior high jumper, took the top off the event...

Pups and pop-pops are ready for banner year in 2026

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
Just some kid - One-mile walkers and 5K runners mesh at the end of their endeavors. This little guy...

Well-coached players don’t do dumb stuff

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
Don’t do dumb stuff - Forty years ago, I wrote that the Cape boys’ lacrosse team was the best- and...

The spiritually secure hit harder than heathens

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
Sunday morning coming down - On a Sunday morning in Lewes 50 years ago, the Fred house front-door...

Governor’s Cup gets prime placement in Cape...

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
In My Room - “Do my dreaming and my scheming. Lie awake and pray. Do my crying and my sighing...

The whammy is bad, but the double whammy is worse

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
The whammy - Two extended arms with fingers on both hands wiggling coming from a sports person is...

Great athletes snap wherever they matriculate

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
The Warrior - A song by American rock band Scandal (1984) reached No. 1 in Canada. The band was...

Cute person wins Ugly Sweater 5K

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
Redemption Song - Flor Duerr of Dover was rocking it Saturday morning at the Redemption City Ugly...

I rarely read, except for T-shirts and tattoos

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
Run for Dad - I’m a writer more than a reader, yet I read T-shirts and tattoos. The subjects are...

Remember when I was young and so were you?

Dave Frederick
9 months ago
Remember me? Thousands of photos were already taken at Flag Alley Saturday morning at a turnaround...

Sports memories are often when we were at our best 

Dave Frederick
10 months ago
Life coach - I received a wonderful surprise home visit from Linwood Downing and Lance White...

Connections lead back to the Atlantic City Steel Pier

Dave Frederick
10 months ago
Pumpkin Pie 5K - The Pumpkin Pie 5K is always a great race the Saturday after Thanksgiving. It’s...

Turkey soup: connections for which to be thankful

Dave Frederick
10 months ago
Turkey soup - Risking my sharp, satirical and sardonic edge, I've been writing more “Turkey Soup...

Ivy alumni are an entangled web of athletes

Dave Frederick
10 months ago
Yale Lockdowns - “Fredman, I just read that a young man named Brenner Short has committed to play...

Staying silent at football games is a tall order

Dave Frederick
10 months ago
Sounds of silence - It’s a tall order to ask a crowd of 50,000 rabid fans – many of whom have been...

Alphas and boomers stride and collide 

Dave Frederick
10 months ago
Boomers and bouncers - Allen “Chattahoochee” Jackson, 57, straight outta Milton, representing...

Fall colors captured at cross country races and in...

Dave Frederick
10 months ago
Tapestry - A cross country race through the flora and fauna of fall foliage ambulates like a...

Lady bugs and lessons of sportsmanship at XC...

Dave Frederick
10 months ago
Cape Guy - You know the Capital One Bank Guy? Well, after the Sesame Street by the Sea Fred...

Showed up for a single photo and a XC race broke out

Dave Frederick
11 months ago
Cross purposes - I showed up at Cape Tuesday afternoon to grab a photo of Logan Crotty for...

Happy is the heart of the long distance runner with...

Dave Frederick
11 months ago
Happy at last - Let’s face it, some body types are better suited for distance running and others...

Mortal muppets nestled inside the sock drawer of...

Dave Frederick
11 months ago
Marauding middle schoolers - A scheduled middle school cross country meet Oct. 29 at Killens Pond...

Shiny, happy people laughing at Sea Witch 5K

Dave Frederick
11 months ago
Happy Together! Beautiful spirits and smiling faces. I don't know if I’ve ever been that happy on a...

Come get these sports memories

Dave Frederick
11 months ago
We Are the Champions! I lifted the following paragraph from Jay Futcher’s obituary, which appears...

The world of school sports is full of surprise and...

Dave Frederick
11 months ago
Captain Marvel - Forty-five years a sports reporter, and I still feel great surprise and wonderment...

There are no dead heats in cross country races

Dave Frederick
11 months ago
Dead heat - I was heading to JV field hockey when I saw there was a middle school cross country...

Every athlete teaches life lessons

11 months ago
Harrington Harrier - Matt Sparacino, representing Races2Run in a Seashore Striders racing event,...

Coaches are the unsung heroes of middle school 

Dave Frederick
11 months ago
National Coaches Day - Like most fans, I didn’t know Monday was National Coaches Day. That was...