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St. Mary
Hawks
take part
in tourney
The St. Mary Hawks Boys Basketball Varsity and JV teams both traveled to Bridgeport last weekend to participate in the New England CYO Basketball Tournament. The JV team lost in the first round, while the Varsity team won in the quarter finals and lost in the semi-finals.
The Hawks’ Varsity squad started out on a down note as point-guard Trent Peters suffered an asthma attaack two minutes into the quarter final game against St. Michael, of Springfield, Mass.. Trent was taken to the hospital and released shortly afterwards, but was unable to play the remainder of the weekend.
Brian Barrette and Nate Whittenburg combined to take over Trent’s minutes , while Will Bourgeois and Austin Miller took turns at the point. The team stepped up their game against an aggressive St. Michael team and won 50-38. Austin Miller led all scorers with 26 points, while Bourgeois netted 14 points. The Hawks used a variety of presses to frustrate St. Michael and control the tempo of the game.
The semi-final game against St. Andrew of Bridgeport was a totally different situation. St. Andrew started two players at 6’3" who were complete basketball players who played “above the rim”. Peters absence was evident as the Hawks had trouble with the full-court pressure which resulted in some easy baskets. The Hawks, who had won all 22 previous games by double figures, played hard but were overmatched by the much larger team from Bridgeport. Will Bourgeois led the Hawks with 22 points and 10 rebounds while Brian Barrette added 6 points. John McGinn also had 10 rebounds for the Hawks. St. Andrew went on to win the tournament.
St. Mary finishes their dream season with a final record of 22-1. The Hawks averaged 53 points per game for the season while their defense allowed 30 points per game. Highlights of the season include an undefeated regular season championship in the 395 League and the 395 League Tournament Championship. The Hawks also were the champions in the St. James Annual Christmas Tournament and the Norwich Diocesan Tournament. In addition, St. Mary tied for 3rd in the New England CYO Tournament.
St. Mary will graduate seven key players from this year’s team; Brian Barrette, Will Bourgeois, John McGinn, Austin Miller, Ian Waldron, Trent Peters and Patrick Bieger. The Hawks will also have to replace Coaches Mike Bourgeois and Pete Peters who have coached the team for the last four years. The team hopes to continue with their success as the JV squad also qualified for the New England Tournament this year.
Junior Varsity
The Cinderella storybook season for Putnam’s St. Mary’s School junior varsity boys basketball season came to a close this weekend in Bridgeport Connecticut at the New England Catholic Middle Schools championship Tourney. The local boys, inspired by their own varsity boys undefeated run this year, hit their stride at mid season and never looked back. After finishing 3rd in the local 395 League tourney, the boys went on to upset their way to the top winning the Norwich Diocesan Championship and the right to represent the diocese at the New England’s this past weekend. Led offensively all season by the sixth grade trio of Tyler Lefebrve, Cris Rovero, and Nick Foucault, the team averaged 28 points per game for and their tenacious defense led again by Lefebvre, Rovero and fifth grader Daniel Harrington, gave up only 24 ppg. Sixth graders Matt Blanc and Josh Eilerman were big contributors on both ends, and fifth graders Hunter Stadig, Andrew Baryliski and Joshua Wojick provided strong support off the bench.
The JV boys squared off against the Boston Diocesan Champs from St. Raphael’s of Medford Friday night. The Medford boys team came to the tourney via a strong 13-1 season in the tough North Shore league of Massachusetts. It was a great matchup with the boys from Medford jumping out to a 20-6 first half lead, but the local Hawks, as they have done all season, never gave up and clawed their way back into the game, outscoring the Medford boys 24-20 for the remainder of the game. In the end they simply ran out of time and came up short, 40-30. Tyler Lefebrve and Nick Foucault led the Hawks offensively with 14 and 12 points