- Details
- Category: Current Issue
Roundup
Saucier back;
Centaurs post
shutout win
There were two key returnees on the field for the Woodstock Academy football team Oct. 15 in Colchester.
Coach Sean Saucier was back on the sidelines and senior receiver Carter Saracina was back in uniform.
The two led the Centaurs to a 28-0 win over Bacon Academy that evened the football team’s record at 2-2.
Saucier had been away from the team since his son, Woodstock quarterback Braiden, suffered a medical emergency in the first half of the first game of the season.
“It was great to be around the kids again; to be around the atmosphere of the team and the family feel and the normalcy and getting back into the routine. It wasn’t easy but it was great at the same time,” Saucier said.
“That’s amazing,” senior lineman Evan Roy said of his coach’s return. “He sets the tone when he is there and that tone is all we need. It gets us going.”
But, there was still some adjustment.
“When I went back to practice on Monday, it felt like a different team. Monday was a little awkward for me. I got over that quickly and by Tuesday I was back in the flow of things. When you are away for a month, to fit back in is a challenge,” Saucier said.
Fortunately, the team was coming off a bye week which most, including Saucier, thought was beneficial after a pair of losses to Windham and East Lyme.
“It really helped us to come back from injuries. We had a lot of injuries on this team and it made us stronger. We had that week off to build as a team and get technique down,” Roy said.
It was also a chance to get Saracina back into the scheme and he was a key against Bacon.
The senior made his presence felt early when he reeled in a 43-yard pass just a minute and a half into the game and brought it into the end zone for the 7-0 Woodstock lead.
Saracina finished with eight catches for 276 yards on the afternoon.
The game remained a one-touchdown affair until Bacon threatened early in the second quarter.
The Centaurs defense held and forced the Bobcats to turn the ball over on downs at the Centaurs 2-yard line.
Three plays later, quarterback Teddy Richardson saw Saracina open down the middle and hit him in stride for a 93-yard touchdown pass to make it 14-0.
With 54 seconds left in the half, Richardson threw a receiver screen to Brandon Nagle who slipped on the muddy field but recovered and found a lane for a 28-yard touchdown catch.
Saracina finished things off with a 12-yard grab in the third quarter.
Richardson finished the day 14-for-25 passing for 337 yards.
“I watched the last three games on Livestream, but (Saturday), I really felt like he has improved. He has taken a lot of coaching. You put anyone in there as a varsity quarterback without experience, it’s not going to be pretty most of the time. He got inserted into an offense that was designed for someone else and give (offensive coordinator) Connor (Elliott) credit because he had to figure out what works for Teddy and we’re starting to get to that point,” Saucier said.
Trevor Savoie added 81 yards on the ground in 15 carries for Woodstock.
The Centaurs will next play under the lights on Friday night at 6 p.m. in Montville.
Volleyball
Centaurs fall to Vikings in battle of Div. I leaders
The Woodstock volleyball team was hoping to return from East Lyme with at least a share of the ECC Div. I regular season title. The always tough Vikings dashed those hopes.
E. Lyme scored a 3-1 victory over the Centaurs Oct. 14 that dropped Woodstock to 10-5 overall and 3-2 in ECC Div. I.
“It seems like any time we play a divisional opponent in their gym, it’s tough for us,” said coach Adam Bottone said. “For a while, we were doing things that weren’t great, but we’re on an upward trajectory with the things we’re doing so we did a lot of good things at East Lyme; defensively, offensively and with our serving and passing.”
Bottone is just looking for a little more consistency.
The Vikings captured the first two sets of the match, 25-22 and 25-21.
But in those sets, Woodstock did go on some runs and led by as many as six points in each only to fall victim to a momentum killer.
“We would have runs of like eight points, be playing great and then a service error at an inopportune time or a ball dropping (to the floor) or we hit one out because we didn’t make the proper contact,” Bottone said.
But Woodstock didn’t leave town without a fight as it rallied for a 27-25 victory in the third set. East Lyme (11-3, 4-1 ECC Div. I) won its seventh straight match with a 25-19 decision in the fourth set.
“While we did lose and likely gave them the Division I championship, the progress moving forward into the ECC tournament and, eventually, the States, if we can just fine tune those things that we are just a little bit off on, we will be in a really good place,” Bottone said.
Liliana Bottone paced the Centaurs with 16 kills and 13 digs; Ellie Nunes added 17 digs and Sophie Gronski contributed 28 assists.
Liliana Bottone and Nunes returned earlier in the week after both suffered injuries that had kept them out for a couple of matches.
“Just having their consistency back is good and their return provides me with more depth when people are struggling. I can go to a Mia Sorrentino or move Morgan (Bonin) from an outside (hitter) to the middle. It creates a lot of different scenarios for us,” Adam Bottone said of their return.
Earlier in the week, the Centaurs celebrated Dig Pink Night with a 3-0 shutout victory over NFA.
The win made up for a 3-2 loss to NFA earlier in the season in Norwich.
Nunes, the Centaurs libero, had an injured hand in that first match and was used sparingly.
But she was back to good health this time around and it showed as she delivered eight digs and provided the Centaurs with some much needed defensive play.
Woodstock won the first set, 25-21, and never let up, scoring 25-19 and 25-18 wins in the second and third sets.
Liliana Bottone, herself not too far removed from an injury, contributed a team-best nine kills to go along with seven digs, four aces and a block.
Bonin had six kills while Cassidy Ladd tossed in five digs and three aces.
The Centaurs opened the week with a 3-2 victory on the road at SMSA Oct. 12.
The host SMSA team took the first set, 25-18, but the Centaurs responded to the challenge by taking the next two, 25-16 and 25-19. SMSA forced the fifth and deciding set with a 25-20 rally but the Centaurs polished off the victory with a 15-10 win in the final.
Bonin paced the girls with 11 kills while Leila MacKinnon added eight.
Girls’ Soccer
Centaurs have plenty to play for over next 2 weeks
The Woodstock girls’ soccer team is above the .500 mark.
The Centaurs downed Plainfield last week, 2-0, to raise their record to 5-4-2.
“It’s been awhile,” coach Dennis Snelling said of finally getting above the break-even mark. Since the 2020 season to be exact.
But it does have an impact on the Class L state tournament. Woodstock needs just one tie over its last five matches and it guarantees itself a state tournament berth.
That didn’t happen until the last game of the season a year ago.
The Centaurs are also still in the running for something else, an ECC Div. I regular season title.
They have matches remaining this week with Fitch and NFA, both at home.
Should they be successful in those, it could potentially set up a match for the title on Oct. 24 at E. Lyme.
The schedule has been an up-and-down one. After playing three matches the week before, the Centaurs only had the match with the Panthers last week.
It took a while to get on the board against Plainfield. Maya Orbegozo finally found the ball on her foot close to the end line 22 ½ minutes into the first half.
The senior got the cross to her classmate Grace Gelhaus at the top of the box and Gelhaus was able to beat a Plainfield defender and finished with her off-foot, the right, for her seventh goal of the season and the 1-0 Woodstock lead.
It was the only goal the Centaurs would get for much of the match.
“I thought we would have been able to build a more comfortable lead with the amount of chances we had. It seemed like we were getting the ball close to their net but couldn’t get that finishing pass,” Snelling said.
Woodstock finally got insurance with 11 ½ to play when Leah Costa found fellow sophomore Isabella Selmecki who converted for her second goal of the season.
It meant that going into the next-to-last week of the regular season, the Centaurs have a lot to play for.
“It’s all there and we have the pieces to do it. Everyone is healthy,” Snelling said.
Prep Soccer
Centaurs back on the winning side
After finishing on the wrong side of the scoreboard in their last four matches, the Woodstock prep soccer team posted a pair of victories Oct. 13 and 15.
“We needed (these wins) very badly, just needed something to go our way,” said coach Joe Cherackal.
The Centaurs opened the week with a 4-1 win over Pathfinder FC and followed that up with a 7-3 victory over Hoosac School.
The two wins raised the Centaurs overall record to 6-5-2 and they are now 3-2 in the Global Education Sports Partners League.
Lucas Basmadjian was a force against Hoosac as he finished with a hat trick to give him eight goals on the season.
Jesus de la Torre, Brian Manon, Luis Granados and Marc Ballart also scored for the Centaurs.
Woodstock let Pathfinder hang around a bit longer than Cherackal would have liked Oct. 13.
“I think the final score didn’t reflect how many chances we had in the first half but that’s been the story of the season so far and going into the second half, Pathfinder was still in the game and it shouldn’t have been,” the Centaurs coach said.
Woodstock converted on a penalty kick early by Manu Marquez and that was equaled by a goal from the visitors.
Basmadjian put the Centaurs ahead to stay with 4 minutes, 38 seconds left when he took a pass from Granados.
Cherackal urged his team not to be satisfied with the 1-goal lead at halftime and Basmadjian made his coach a bit happier when he took a pass from Javier Menendez just 15:03 into the second half to put the Centaurs up by a pair of goals.
The Centaurs put a little exclamation point on top when Alejandro Minguela put one in the back of the net with 2:38 left in regulation.
“Alejandro is 14-years-old and the finish that he took (Thursday), I will be very frank, was a professional finish. It was shaped, outside of the frame, coming back on frame and that’s what pros do and it had the pace of a pro and he’s only 14-years-old,” Cherackal said. “Sometimes, our 14-year-olds in games don’t have those opportunities because they are playing 16, 17,18, and 19-year-olds and from the physicality standpoint, it’s hard to be successful.”
Boys’ Soccer
Centaurs fall in Rearden’s return
Woodstock boys’ soccer coach Paul Rearden admitted to feeling a bit like being on the outside looking in.
He had missed the last five matches due to a family emergency in England.
After coming back for a couple of practices, he was back on the pitch on the road at NFA.
“Missing a couple of weeks in midseason is something I’ve never done before so it’s hard to plan practices for a game in two days’ time because you have missed the past two weeks and you don’t know what’s pressing,” Rearden said. “It was good to be at a game (Thursday) but it still felt like I was playing catch up.”
There were things that assistant coach Jason Tata had installed as far as formations and personnel that had worked and Rearden had to familiarize himself with.
There were also the intangibles such as who is playing best currently.
“It’s one thing to be told it and another to actually see and feel it,” Rearden said.
The result was not what Rearden or the Centaurs wanted as they fell to the host Wildcats, 4-1.
The Centaurs were scored on first by the Wildcats but were able to get the equalizer shortly thereafter.
NFA was called for a handball inside the area. It’s not a call that teams get as often anymore and the NFA coaching staff questioned it.
So did Rearden, not the call, but the spot from which the penalty kick was to be taken.
“The markings on that field, you can’t see the lines. There are so many lines on the field, they have it marked up with different colors and such. I couldn’t even tell if the handball was inside the box because I couldn’t tell where the box was,” Rearden said.
Those lines almost came into play just before the PK call as a ball was sent in by Woodstock. The NFA keeper got a hand on it and it hit the crossbar and fell straight down. The officials ruled it did not go over the goal line.
When everything was straightened out, Rearden chose Noah Page to shoot the penalty kick and the senior delivered his third goal of the season.
Unfortunately, the good times wouldn’t last. NFA scored its second goal late in the first half to take a 2-1 lead in what Rearden considered to be a pretty even match.
Then, disaster struck when an NFA corner resulted in the ball striking a Woodstock player with the ball finding its way into the Centaurs net.
“The first two goals we could have and should have cleared but we were indecisive and the third goal was just unlucky,” Rearden said.
Rearden then moved up the defense a bit and left only three in the back which helped the Wildcats create the insurmountable advantage.
“I gambled,.” Rearden said. “It was one of those, ‘you might as well get me 4-1 instead of 3-1’ as we got caught up outnumbered. Until that third goal, it was pretty even.”
The Centaurs go into the next-to-last week of the regular season with a 4-5-2 overall record and a 1-3 mark in Division I of the Eastern Connecticut Conference.
Woodstock still has bookend home matches against Bacon Academy and Ledyard and away matches at Fitch, Granby and East Lyme.
Marc Allard
Director of Sports Information
The Woodstock Academy
.