WFMD Sports is proud to announce the WFMD/Nymeo Federal Credit Union High School Athletes of the Month for September, 2017:

Senior Abbey Burdette,  soccer star at Urbana High School is headed for the University of Tennessee next season.   Recently she has set the all time record at Urbana for career assists with 34 and counting, she is also up to second all time at Urbana for career points with 132,  and most impressive of all the Urbana team has a 50-8-5 record scince she started playing for the Hawks and Coach Chuck Nichols  in the Fall of 2014.  Urbana girls soccer is again undefeated so far this season which includes the month of September (9-0-1).   In all the Hawks have won the following championships during the Burdette years:  2 CMC titles, 1 3A West Championship and the 2016 3A Maryland State Championship!     Last year as a Junior, Abbey was named to the MACS first team All-State!   She has been named to the first team all Frederick News Post and all CMC teams all three years of her career so far!   Coach Nichols says that as impressive as her statistics are,  it is her "fire and passion" that have set the standard for Urbana.  

Senior Billy Gant has been the starting quarterback for the Walkersville High School football team for three seasons.   And what a three year ride it has been!   11-3 and second place in the state in 2015!    14-0 and the 2A Maryland State Championship in 2016!    6-0 so far this season, including a 5-0 mark in September.  When they talk about great quarterbacks they say, "all he does is win."   This certainly applys to Billy Gant who began his incredible run, for Coach Joe Polce, guiding the Lions to a close road win over Thomas Johnson in the opening game of the 2015 season when Bill was a rookie sophomore.  What kind of an offensive juggernaut does Billy Gant lead?  So far this season the Lions are averaging 59 points a game!   Individually in the month of September, Billy was 28 for 39 for 472 yards and 9 touchdowns.  His completion percentage was .667!   

Abbey Burdette, the all time girls soccer assist leader at Urbana High School,  has no doubt about her greatest thrill in high school sports:  Winning the 2016 Maryland 3A Girls Soccer Championship!    What does Walkersville quarterback Billy Gant do when he throws a rare interception?    He goes right to the sideline and watches himself on a video device to make sure he doesn't repeat his mistake.   These are just two of the candid answers you will hear on Frederick County Sports Weekend this Sunday as these two young athletes give us a peek inside their sports programs that have been so successful.  Both Urbana girls soccer and Walkersville football were undefeated in the month of September so it is appropriate that these two leaders were chosen as High School Athletes of the Month in Frederick County.   Abbey Burdette will play soccer at the University of Tennessee next season and she talks about what a challenge awaits her, but she sounds confident.      Billy Gant knows that Walkersville, to win a second straight 2A state championship,  will have to plow through the likes of Oakdale and Damascus this season but all he could talk about was the stable of talented athletes around him and he gave special praise to the "big" Lion's offensive line!   It's hard to imagine two better representatives of high school sports in Frederick County! 

32 young women and 21 young men make up the combined cross country team of Frederick High School under the leadership of Coach Frank Strakonski who began teaching at Frederick High back in 1986.  The team includes the largest number of freshmen out for cross country in the history of Frederick High according to Frederick P.A. announcer and coach Brandon Brubaker.  We welcomed 3 of those young athletes into the WFMD studio this week:   Senior Sydni Brown, one of the Captains and a member of Frederick's state champion Girls Outdoor Track and Field team last Spring, Junior Shannah Comeau (maybe the fastest runner on the team according to her coach) and the promising Freshman Mario Martinez who can really fly and already is using strategy to beat other runners.   The team had just returned from a big cross country meet in New Jersey.   Coach Strakonski said the school found itself without a boys C.C. coach this summer  and he said he met with Frederick High Athletic Director Keivette Hammond and they decided to go with a combined team of boys and girls and take part in meets around the county and state this season.    Coach Strakonski emphsizes two hour team practices every day with total running of about six miles.   Coach Strakonski said everything is new at Frederick High School this year including the "lynx" program which allows students to make their own choices and has allowed the team to have suppers together at the school.