Date: Fri 16-May-1997

Publication: Bee

Author: KIMH

Quick Words:

Delphine-Tuot-Scholar-Athlete

Full Text:

Delphine Tuot: Scholar-Athlete

Delphine Tuot Is Newtown High School's

CIAC Female Scholar-Athlete For 1997

B Y K IM J. H ARMON

Delphine Tuot has had some good friends, some good teachers, and some great

teammates and she reflects on her years at Newtown High School and her CIAC

Scholar-Athlete Award she realizes she might not be where she is today and

might not be heading where she's heading without them.

Delphine, 17, has her friends to thank for getting her involved in volleyball,

one of her former teachers for firing her imagination and love of life, and

her former teammates for helping her expand and develop her considerable

athletic abilities.

It was her athletic achievements - six letters earned in tennis and volleyball

back to sophomore year - and her No. 2 ranking in the Class of '97 which

earned Delphine the female CIAC Scholar-Athlete Award for Newtown High School.

Right now Delphine is in the midst of her third straight season as

first-doubles with the girls' tennis team, but she is just two months removed

from her part in the first-ever CIAC state volleyball championship which

Newtown High School earned this past winter.

Even though the sun is shining and there is not a hint of snow anywhere,

Delphine can't stop her thoughts from drifting back to those almost magical

days when the Nighthawks romped through the CIAC state tournament right to the

state championship.

"I still think about it," she admitted. "It was just so thrilling I still

can't put it into words."

But it will be one of those indelible memories she will take with her when she

becomes an incoming freshman at Stanford University this fall and begins the

curriculum that will lead her through her pre-med studies.

Learning From The Best

The Nighthawk volleyball team was one of those teams that was simply chock

full of great players - from setter Leigh Hoppmeyer to hitters Dee Conley and

Kristin Denninger - but it still had room for one more . . . Delphine Tuot.

Trouble was, with the stars of Hoppmeyer and Conley and Denninger shining so

brightly on the volleyball landscape, it was hard sometimes to see one named

Delphine.

"It never really bothered me," she said. "I never though I was the caliber of

player that they were. They gave me a lot of good advice and it was thrilling

just to play with them."

Delphine's skills as a volleyball player grew dramatically since her sophomore

year. That was her first year in the sport, thanks to the recruitment of her

friend Allison Stephenson, and even though it was, former coach Russ Weiss saw

enough ability in her that she was named to the varsity unit.

"I was just hoping to get on jayvee," she said, "but Mr Weiss thought I had

enough raw skills to keep me on varsity. Ali Bernstein and Kristin

(Denninger), though, showed me what it was like to give everything you had

every game."

She didn't play a lot as a sophomore, instead spending time learning the

concepts of the game, but she did find her way onto the court more and more

until, as a junior, she became a fixture.

"I think a lot of it was a product of playing with good athletes," said

Delphine. "If you play with the best, your caliber of play goes up."

It might not have been if she hadn't grown tired of the individualism of

gymnastics. After doing that for years and years, right up through her

freshman year, Delphine was more interested in playing something more social,

something more team-oriented.

That's where volleyball and tennis came in.

And that stuff will continue, to a lesser degree, as Delphine concentrates on

her other love - biology.

"I always loved life, in general," said Delphine, "and Mr [Tom] Kuroski got me

in love with biology. All the mysteries of life . . . it's just so

fascinating."

But she will be able to do both, to mix sports and academics as much as she

can, because - to Delphine Tuot - living a balanced life is what it is all

about.