Roundup
Centaurs advance to ECC Div. I championship
The dream of the Woodstock Academy girls’ basketball team is to play at the Mohegan Sun Arena twice this season.
They are halfway there.
The Centaurs, after a win over Stonington in the ECC semifinals on Saturday, made their first appearance ever for the program on the home court of the Connecticut Sun as they played the New London Whalers for the ECC Div. I title Monday (the game ended too late for this edition).
To get a return trip to the Mohegan Sun Arena, the Centaurs would have to be playing for a CIAC Div. II state championship as the Sun also hosts all of the state title games.
The Centaurs were looking forward to their inaugural journey.
“We’ve been building for this for four years and it feels good to get the payoff for it. It’s about building our culture and proving to some of our underclassmen that it may take time, may take a few years but we’re always going to be in contention to play for any title we want,” said senior Isabel D’Alleva-Bochain. “I want to treat it like any other basketball game but it’s going to be exciting.”
The Centaurs expected to be matched up with top-seeded Ledyard in the championship game, but New London had other ideas.
The fourth-seeded Whalers downed the Colonels, 52-35, in the semifinals to earn the trip to the title tilt opposite the Centaurs.
“I think it’s special because we get to compete for a title, obviously, but I think it’s really special because I think the kids set this as a goal back in the spring of last year so to be able to get close to those goals and make them happen makes me ecstatic because I’m happy for them to be happy,” coach Will Fleeton said.
There is an old saying that offense wins games, defense wins championships.
It has often proven to be true. Woodstock would certainly not argue.
It has been defense that has paved the way and that was true again on Saturday as the Centaurs held Stonington to just 26 percent shooting from the floor in a 45-24 win.
“I’m very proud of the kids for their effort. We did some things a little different than the norm to combat Stonington inside and I think the kids did a good job executing it. It worked out in our favor which allowed us to hold their total numbers down,” Fleeton said.
The Centaurs frequently sent numerous bodies into the paint to battle the Bears with D’Alleva-Bochain often in the low post on the back side, getting help from her teammates from the front.
“Whatever the team needs, I can step back on scoring. They’re big so I probably wasn’t going to get much in the paint so I concentrated on rebounds and getting in front of them. It was physical,” D’Alleva-Bochain said.
It was the Bears who broke out early, however, as they held a 9-4 lead in the closing seconds of the first quarter but it was the Centaurs who would go into the huddle at the end of the first eight minutes with the feel-good vibes.
That’s because as the final second ticked down, senior guard Kaylee Saucier uncorked a shot from half court that found the bottom of the net as the buzzer sounded.
“That’s my second (half court shot) of the year that I made and it’s kind of luck to be honest. I think I made one 3-(pointer) so to hit a shot like that, not only for myself, but the team, it gives everyone a little more motivation,” Saucier said.
Fleeton wasn’t all that surprised that his senior made that shot.
“Very huge, very big, but am I surprised? I think I’ve seen enough of them. As weird as it may sound, we do practice that type of thing, so I am not as surprised as most and she is skilled enough to be able to shoot those, “ he said.
Saucier wasn’t done with her momentum-building, however.
The Centaurs opened things up in the second quarter as they held the Bears to just four points while scoring 15 of their own including another basket at the buzzer by Saucier.
“It was a great look by Viv (Vivian Bibeau),” Saucier said. “Honestly, I didn’t even know how much time was on the clock, I just knew there were a couple of seconds and I just floated it over the top of the rim.”
Up by nine at the half, the Centaurs outscored Stonington 14-4 in the third quarter with a defense that just stifled the Bears’ attack.
“That’s what we worked on in practice (Friday). They have two really good bigs and we don’t have the most height so to be able to front them and have good backside help and then, we just had to finish with the rebound,” Saucier said.
Sophia Hoinsky came into the game averaging 19 points a contest and Addison Cadmus has put down 14 a game for Stonington this season. The Centaurs held them to nine and two points respectively.
Bibeau led the Centaurs with 11 points while Saucier added 10 and D’Alleva-Bochain nine, seven of those in the second half.
The Centaurs advanced to the semifinals of the tournament with a 48-36 win over Norwich Free Academy in a quarterfinal contest.
It marked the start of the portion of the season where it’s win or, in this case, stay home.
“It’s a different feeling. You have to come to play every day. Like Coach (Fleeton) said at halftime, we’re fighting but they came to fight too. They wouldn’t come up here if they weren’t ready so we have to be ready every time we step on the floor,” Saucier said.
The Centaurs did build the early lead but never could shed the Wildcats early and led by only six, 21-15, with just under a minute to play in the first half.
But, as it was against Stonington in the semifinals, the Centaurs got the timely 3-pointer and a nice defensive play that gave them momentum going into halftime.
Bibeau hit a 3-pointer and followed that with a steal and then found Saucier with a pass in the paint for a drive to the hoop that resulted in two more points and a double-digit lead at the break.
“That was huge,” Saucier said. “Turning defense into offense at any time is good but especially getting momentum going into half. They struggled against our press and I would hate to see Viv if I was on the other team out there at the top.”
NFA could only get as close as eight points in the third quarter and trailed by nine at the end of the period. A 7-2 run by Woodstock to open the fourth essentially ended the Wildcats’ hopes.
Saucier led the Centaurs with 14 points while D’Alleva-Bochain added 13 and Bibeau chipped in with 11.
“They’re unselfish,” Fleeton said. “They have been that way since I met them. I would like to take some credit that I helped a little along the way but they have been unselfish since Day 1. Now, they are smarter, older, bigger, stronger and faster so those passes come out quicker and they see things that they didn’t see a couple of years ago and they really share sometimes to a fault. Sometimes, we’re shooting with four seconds left on the shot clock because they are confident that they will find their look and they got me believing now. I don’t sweat it anymore when we get to the 3, 2, 1 (on the shot clock).”
Saucier and D’Alleva-Bochain were named Eastern Connecticut Conference Division I All-Stars with Allison Camara and Bibeau getting Honorable Mention nods. D’Alleva-Bochain is the team’s ECC Scholar-Athlete with Elise Coyle receiving the team’s ECC Sportsmanship Award.
Boys’ Hockey
Looking at the wins and losses, the boys’ hockey team did not have its best season.
But there were signs of hope for the future.
That started with Senior Day. The Centaurs only recognized three players prior to their game with Lyman Hall.
Logan Rumrill, Vaughn Buzak and Alex Haggerty were the trio of players who will leave the program and the school when they graduate in June.
“It’s a good group of guys,” said first-year coach Drew Beaupre of his small group of seniors. “Logan Rumrill is an alternate captain and a huge leader. Vaughn Buzak is a great kid to have on the team and Alex Haggerty was a late addition but has had a huge impact on the ice already.”
The small group means Beaupre will have basically the same team in place come next hockey season.
“We’re basically coming back with the same group. We don’t know what we have coming in but we already have a group of freshmen that put up big varsity minutes. We have a huge junior class that we will rely on a lot and then, hopefully, some of the other young guys will make a leap between this year and next and I think, if that happens, we will be in really good shape,” Beaupre said.
Some of that progress was seen in the past week.
On Wednesday, the Centaurs traveled to Norwich where they took on the Eastern Connecticut Eagles.
Eastern Connecticut brought a 14-4 record into the game and had shutout the Centaurs in their first meeting, 6-0, early in the season.
The Centaurs hung with the Eagles, playing a scoreless first two periods before Eastern Connecticut got on the board with two goals in the third.
The Centaurs did close the gap when junior Josh May tallied off assists from Gabe Flannery and A.J. Malone.
Goalie Brady Hebert had a sterling performance as he turned aside 57 shots in the game.
The Eagles put away the 3-1 victory on an empty net goal in the game’s closing moments.
“You can see the progress that we have made with the young squad that we have. A couple of bounces here and there and a couple of those results could have been different. There has been progress since the early portion of the season and we saw that in the game against the Eagles. We had a rough go against them in the first few weeks of the season and had a much better showing (Wednesday),” Beaupre said.
The Centaurs finished the regular season with a 2-18 record as Lyman Hall got the best of them Saturday, 7-2.
Camden Marshall and May had the goals for Woodstock with Buzak and Jackson Aleman getting assists.
“It was an experience,” Beaupre said of the regular season as a whole. “Coming in, I knew there was going to be a lot of work to do, it was, obviously, going to be a building year because of the age groups that we had. It felt like a long season in the middle of it, but now that we’re at the tail end, it feels like it flew by.”
The season hasn’t come to a complete close as of yet. The Centaurs, Eagles, Tri-Town and Suffield-Granby-Windsor Locks-East Granby teams will participate in the Nutmeg Conference tournament.
The Centaurs will play the Suffield co-op in a semifinal at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday at the ISCC Rink in Simsbury.
“It’s a little of something (to finish with),” Beaupre said. “These are all teams we can compete with. We just had a good showing against Eastern Connecticut; we had a close loss to Suffield the first time and we split with Tri-Town so we would love another chance at any of them. It’s great.”
Boys’ Basketball
The boys’ basketball team ran into a player with a hot hand for Norwich Free Academy.
A very hot hand. Jamier Ford set a school record for the Wildcats as he made nine 3-pointers in the game, finished with 31 points, and led third-seeded NFA to a 78-58 win over No. 6 Woodstock in an ECC quarterfinal on Thursday.
Ford hit four 3-pointers in the first quarter alone and then added three more in the second to put the Wildcats up by 18 at the half.
NFA also did a good job defensively as it held sophomore guard Drake Abdullovski to just two field goals and 10 points. The team’s second-leading scorer, Xawier Matwiej, mustered only four points.
Mert Coker led the Centaurs with 13 points while Vuk Lisancic contributed 12.
Abdullovski was named an Eastern Connecticut Conference Division I All-Star while Matwiej received Honorable Mention.
Nate Couture earned the team’s ECC Scholar-Athlete Award with Ryan Chabot getting the nod for the ECC Sportsmanship Award.
The season is not over for the Centaurs boys. The Div. III state tournament still looms with Woodstock likely getting a first-round home game on Saturday although the opponent has not been determined as of yet.
State Tournament
A host of Woodstock athletes competed individually in state events over the last week.
Three members of the boys’ and girls’ indoor track team headed to Boston for the New England Indoor Track championships.
It wasn’t the best of days for the Centaurs. Emma Weitknecht finished 13th in the 55m hurdles in 8.62 seconds.
“She was caught off guard by a very fast command from the starter and left the blocks late and the heat, as a whole, was slower than anticipated,” said coach Josh Welch.
Fellow senior Avery Plouffe had to fly back from a trip to Florida with the music department to compete and had little time to practice over the course of the week.
The rust showed as Plouffe could not get a rhythm going, according to Welch, and finished 21st.
Fellow senior Eli Manning had a 49-foot, 8-inch throw in the shotput, also not his best this season, and placed 15th.
Senior Olivia DiGregorio made it into the second day of competition at the CIAC girls’ wrestling championship.
DiGregorio won her first match by pin as she took down Cora Nevard of St. Joseph’s in 1 minute, 39 seconds.
That was the good news. It put her into a match, however, against the top seed in the 132-pound division Elliana Selearis of Amity.
The junior, who would go on to win the state title in the division, jumped out to a 6-1 lead and then pinned DiGregorio in 1:24.
The loss dropped DiGregorio into the consolation bracket where she did pick up a couple of victories.
She pinned Bella Broughton of Waterford in 2:23 and then scored a 13-4 major decision victory over Addalynn Southworth of Conard.
The win over Southworth pushed DiGregorio into the second day of the tournament but her journey back to New Haven was short-lived as she was pinned in her first match by Danbury’s Isabella Dupree.
Two members of the Woodstock wrestling team received ECC Honorable Mention recognition.
Aidan Soukaloun and Jake Henderson were named as such with Owen Hamilton earning the team’s ECC Scholar-Athlete Award and A.J. Landreville receiving the team’s ECC Sportsmanship honor.
Two members of the gymnastics team competed in the CIAC State Open championship.
Junior Rhea Desota tied for 22nd with an 8.25 effort in her bars routine while senior Emma Long finished in a tie for 35th in the vault with an 8.35 performance.
The dance team participated in the CIAC dance championship Saturday and placed fifth in the small group jazz division in its final competition of the year.
Marc Allard
Director of Sports Information
The Woodstock Academy
Seniors, from left: Alex Haggerty, Logan Rumrill and Vaughn Buzak were recognized on boys’ hockey Senior Day. Photo by Collin Singleton/Woodstock Academy.
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Isabel D’Alleva-Bochain (33) shoots over New London’s Kemiyah Willis in a game played earlier this season. Photo by Joshua Hernandez / actionframe_media.
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Kaylee Saucier, in a game earlier this season, drives to the hoop against New London. Photo by Joshua Hernandez / actionframe_media.
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