The Scoreboard is a sports feature spotlighting the winners and losers, the champs and chumps, the highlights and lowlights, and anything in between, of sports in the D.C. area.
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Kerry Allen knows exactly what she’ll be doing on Feb. 29, 2020. Over the weekend, the 30-year-old Columbia Heights resident qualified for the Olympic Marathon Trials by finishing the Twin Cities Marathon in Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota in 2 hours, 41 minutes, and 33 seconds. Her time is several minutes under the minimum standard for the Olympic trials.
“It’s something I had felt was possible for the last few years,” Allen tells City Paper. “I knew I was capable of doing it, but being capable is very different than actually doing it.”
She will join several other D.C.-area runners who have already qualified to race in Atlanta, which will host the trials in 2020. According to RunWashington’s Charlie Ban, that list includes Bethany Sachtleben, Kelly Calway, Jessica McGuire, Shauneen Werlinger, Caitlyn Tateishi, and Jillian Pollack on the women’s side. Kyle Stanton of Rockville has qualified to represent the area men.
“It’s awesome that we have that many women in the D.C. area that have achieved this,” says Allen, the president of the elite post-collegiate Georgetown Running Club. “I think each one of those runners has a really cool story.”
Injury Prone
The Wizards appear to be limping into the regular season. The season opener against the New York Knicks at Capital One Arena is scheduled for Oct. 18 and Dwight Howard, the big-name offseason acquisition, has yet to play for the team. The All-Star center was originally diagnosed with a lower back injury before visiting a specialist in New York, who diagnosed Howard with a piriformis (buttocks muscle) injury, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic.
Thomas Bryant, another big man, hyperextended his left knee and sprained his left ankle during a preseason game this week. His timeline, like Howard’s, remains uncertain.
But the Wizards aren’t too worried. Not yet, at least
“I think when you get to the regular season and [Howard’s injury] gets real bad, that’s tough for us, but he’s been working out and taking the next step as he can,” point guard John Wall told The Washington Post. “That’s all we can do is sit back and wait to see what happens after that.”
Crisis PR
Josh Norman was once considered one the best cornerbacks in the National Football League. In 2016, just two days after being released by the Carolina Panthers, the local NFL team gave Norman a five-year, $75 million deal, making him the highest paid cornerback in NFL history at the time. Two years later, he’s not even the best player at his position on his own team, according to analysts.
He was benched briefly to start the second half of Monday night’s 43-19 loss to the New Orleans Saints. Afterward, Norman made even more headlines when he got into a Twitter exchange with Saints wide receiver Michael Thomas, who trash talked him during the game.
During the game broadcast, analyst Booger McFarland declared that Quinton Dunbar is the Washington football team’s best cornerback, not Norman.
“Fundamentals are kind of killing him on his press technique, and being disciplined,” the team’s former general manager Charley Casserly told The Sports Junkies last week. “He never was the most disciplined guy. He’s very competitive, he’s just not doing a good job with his hands-on press.”
DeAngelo Hall, a former NFL defensive back and teammate of Norman’s was even harsher, telling The Junkies that, “Josh is, I think, in love with being a celebrity right now and not necessarily being a football player.”