Pairings announced for Field Hockey, Soccer, D-I Football

The Vermont Principals' Association and the Vermont Interscholastic Football League announced the pairings for boys and girls soccer, field hockey and Division I football today.

We have just one No. 1 seed in our area - Peoples Academy girls soccer in Division III - but there are plenty of other local horses in all races except for Division I football and Division I field hockey.

In boys soccer, Harwood earned the No. 5 seed in Division I after posting a regular-season record of 10-3-1. Spaulding will not participate. The Highlanders will host No. 12 Middlebury on Tuesday. In Division II, U-32 earned the No. 2 seed with an 8-3-3 regular-season record and will host Fair Haven on Wednesday. GMVS earned the No. 5 seed and will welcome No. 12 Woodstock on Wednesday while No. 3 Montpelier will host Bellows Falls on Tuesday. Division III is a much more crowded race, locally anyway, with No. 16 Randolph playing at No. 1 BFA-Fairfax, No. 9 Williamstown traveling to No. 8 PA and No. 10 Stowe (a crazy choice for a 10 seed. Look for the Raiders to make it pretty far) plays at No. 7 Northfield, all on Tuesday. On Wednesday, No. 15 Oxbow will play at No. 2 Thetford whlie No. 11 Hazen travels to No. 6 Windsor. In Division IV, No. 3 Chelsea and No. 7 Cabot earned home games - the Red Devils will face No. 14 Craftsbury and the Huskies will play No. 10 South Royalton at Twinfield, both on Tuesday. The Trojans earned the No. 11 seed and will play No. 6 Twin Valley at Brattleboro on Wednesday.

On the girls side in Division I, Spaulding came away with the No. 4 seed with an 11-3 record and will host No. 13 St. Johnsbury on Wednesday. That same day, No. 8 Harwood will welcome No. 9 Colchester. In Division II, No. 9 U-32 will play at No. 8 GMVS on Tuesday while No. 3 Montpelier welcomes No. 14 Fair Haven on Wednesday. In Division III, top-seeded PA will face No. 16 Richford, No. 8 Stowe will play No. 9 Thetford at home, No. 5 Hazen will play No. 12 Sharon, No. 2 Oxbow will welcome No/ 15 Leland & GRay and No. 11 Williamstown will travel to Bellows Falls. All Division III games (for this area) are on Wednesday. In Division IV, No. 5 Chelsea welcomes No. 12 Long Trail while No. 3 Twinfield hosts No. 14 Concord, both on Wednesday.

In a small Division II field hockey field, Harwood earned the No. 3 seed and will get a bye into the quarterfinals where the Highlanders will face No. 6 U-32, which also received a bye, on Thursday. No. 5 Spaulding will also start in the quarterfinal round and the Crimson Tide will travel to Otter Valley on Friday. In Division III, Stowe earned the No. 2 seed and will host No. 7 St. Johnsbury - both received first-round byes - and No. 3 Montpelier will face No. 3 Rice at Essex - again, a pair of byes. Both D-III games are Satruday morning.

Spaulding football earned the No. 13 seed in the D-I playoffs by a coin flip over the weekend and will play at No. 13 Burlington (yeah, the pairings say No. 13 vs. No. 13, but no matter). Only the top eight teams in D-I are eligible for the championship, so this Friday night will be the final game of Spaulding's season.

Keep checking back on our scoreboard page in the print edition for updated pairings each day. Division II and III football pairings will be announced after this final week of their regular season. There's a chance we won't have any local football teams in the postseason - our best hope is for Oxbow or Montpelier to qualify, but both are sitting outside the top four slots, and only four qualify in D-II and D-III. U-32 is out of the picture.

Good luck everyone!

-Anna Grearson

Ravens win postseason awards

The Vermont Ravens made the playoffs again this fall but fell short in a first-round home playoff game against the eventual-champion Rhode Island Riptide. They didn't go home for the winter completely empty-handed, however. The New England Football League announced the Outstanding Players and Coaching Staffs for 2011, in which the Ravens picked up two awards.

The Ravens' coaching staff was named Most Outstanding Coaching Staff 2011 for the Western Division and the Most Outstanding Offensive Players for the Western Division were Vermont running back David Maxfield of Randolph and quarterback Guerschom Jean-Gilles - a Florida native who played four years at Norwich University and is currently an assistant coach with the Cadets.

Congratulations, Ravens!

-Anna Grearson

Benefit for Dylan Mercadante Nov. 2

I was contacted this week by Bill Brooks, who is helping to organize a benefit dinner and auction for the Mercadante family. Dylan Mercadante was seriously injured in a home football game on Sept. 23 and remains in Burlington at a rehabilitation facility. He was able to join his team for the first time since the incident - a one-in-a-trillion hit that burst a blood vessel in his neck, resulting in a pair of strokes - last Friday night for Senior Night (he's a junior). He watched the first half from the sidelines in a wheelchair and received his jersey from teammates and coaches.

Please contact Brooks if you are a business willing to donate items for the auction or if you are interested in tickets. Here's the brief I am putting in the local roundup in Wednesday's print edition of The Times Argus.

Keep up the hard work, Dylan!

Benefit planned for Mercadante family

A dinner/silent auction will take place at the Montpelier Elks Club on Wednesday, Nov. 2, to benefit the family of Dylan Mercadante, the Montpelier football player injured in a Sept. 23 home game.

Organizers are seeking donations for the auction from local businesses. Those interested in donating or who would like to purchase tickets may contact Bill Brooks at 223-0662 or 229-7681.

Tickets, which are also available at the Montpelier Recreation Department and at Minuteman Press in Montpelier, will be $20 and are limited to approximately 250.

-Anna Grearson

Dylan Mercadante "progressing quite well"

I spoke with Montpelier football coach John Murphy this afternoon about Dylan Mercadante, a junior Solon football player who was injured in a home game against Mount Saint Joseph on Friday, Sept. 23. The conversation was immensely positive, I am happy to report.

Mercadante suffered a neck injury that resulted in a broken blood vessel and subsequent strokes and spent about a week in the Intensive Care Unit at Fletcher Allen Healthcare in Burlington. He has since been moved to a rehabilitation facility where his teammates have been able to visit him on Sundays. Coach Murphy is hoping to see him on Thursday, the night before the Solons host Woodstock in a Division-III matchup.

"He's doing really well," Murphy said. "He's walking, and just progressing really well every day. It's been really positive, everyone's happy with the turnaround. He's progressing quite well.

"I can't wait to see him."

-Anna Grearson

Remembering Mac

Today marks one year since we lost one of the area's brightest stars - athletically and in general - after an inspiring and ultimately heartbreaking battle with cancer. Mackenzie Pratt touched so many of our lives, and while I never had the joy of meeting her, I've heard so many stories - all glowing, all now deeply treasured - from her friends and former coaches that I can appreciate how much I missed in not knowing her personally.

Below is the text of the column I wrote the week after she died:

October 18, 2010
Section: SPORTS

On Deck: Mackenzie Pratt was one of a kind
   Anna Grearson

The Vermont sporting world lost one of its brightest stars last Sunday in Mackenzie 'Mac' Pratt. There's no possible way the former Lamoille three-sport standout and softball pitcher at Norwich will ever be forgotten - the innumerable lessons her brief but brilliant life taught us will reverberate farther than she could imagine. Mackenzie was two months shy of her 22nd birthday when she died after battling cancer for the third time. The fact that she took on the soul-wrenching disease three times, all in a very public manner, shows how strong her fighting spirit was.

Copyright, 2010, The Times Argus

 

 She did not hide behind the evidence of chemotherapy's wrath - a bald head - at the tail end of her high school career. And that was at a time when appearance is all many high schoolers are concerned with. Many photos of Mackenzie have surfaced from newspaper archives since last Sunday, and by far my favorite has been the one of Mackenzie and a pair of teammates waiting to check into the final 19.5 seconds of the state basketball championship at the Barre Auditorium, her bald head covered by a colorful bandana.

 What makes the photo one of the more emotional ones on file is not only knowing what comes after - a shot attempt by Mackenzie and a state title for her Lancers - but it's also the smile on her and a teammate's faces as the teammate rubs Mackenzie's head with the entire scorer's table looking on (and the crowd, we assume).

 In the week since her death, the tributes have been pouring in on Facebook and comment sections attached to her obituary and stories telling of her death. And there will be more to come. The Norwich University football team held a moment of silence prior to its game against Husson on Saturday afternoon, which began shortly after the Celebration of Life for Mackenzie got under way at the Lamoille County Field Days complex in Johnson. The Cadets also wore neon green bands on their socks, arms, wrists and shoes in her memory. The sight of the three captains holding hands as they walked to midfield for the coin toss, with the green bands glowing in the overcast afternoon, brought tears to this reporter's eyes.

 A standout soccer goalie, basketball guard and softball pitcher, Mackenzie was a respected part of a team her entire life. She played softball all summer, and it was only fitting that an enormous co-ed softball tournament was held for her the month before her death. Hundreds of players turned out for the event, decked out in brightly colored homemade uniforms, most if not all bearing her nickname 'Mac' in their team names. T-shirts, Silly Bandz and bracelets were designed and sold as part of the fundraiser. The main banner referred to Mackenzie's smile: The Best Smile in the World. (If you haven't seen a picture of her beautiful smile, trust me, it's a show-stopper.)

Mackenzie went to Norwich not only to play softball but also to earn a degree in nursing. It has been said over and over again how she wanted to become a nurse as a way of giving back after all of the care she received during her first two bouts with cancer. Her younger sister, Kylie - also a student and softball pitcher at Norwich - is also a nursing major at the Northfield school. This family seems to be all about giving back in the face of tragedy. What a lesson we can all learn from not only the two daughters but also their parents, Charles and Jean. The whole family has been a part of Lamoille softball for years - as players and coaches and scorekeepers and now the holders of legend.

Mackenzie's obituary was one of the best I've ever read. I never knew Mackenzie, never interviewed her, but I've seen Kylie play and I've interviewed her father after a playoff loss at Harwood. And from all I've heard from her mutual friends and my fellow Vermont Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association members (we voted her female Athlete of the Year in 2007), the obituary captured Mackenzie's character perfectly. She even requested people wear bright colors to her services. Even in the face of a dark and devastating disease, Mackenzie was all about color.

My favorite line: "Mackenzie bounded into the world on Dec. 6, 1988." And she kept bounding, to athletic success everywhere she turned and into the hearts of her closest friends and total strangers alike.

She's no stranger to us, she never was, but it will sure be a strange place without her. Thank you, Mackenzie, for all you've brought to this area athletically and with your smile and your life.

The streak stops at 12

I clearly chose the wrong day to have off this week. And perhaps even the wrong Game of the Week (sorry Montpelier football - prove me wrong tonight against Winooski!).

On paper, this game shouldn't have been considered as a Game of the Week, truth be told. It wouldn't be unheard of to think the Montpelier girls soccer team, at 7-1-1 going into last night's game at then-1-5-1 U-32, would walk away with win No. 8.

But they didn't. U-32 ran - and jumped and screamed and made plans for a pizza party - away with a 1-0 win (it's second of the season) while Montpelier had to settle for loss No. 2.

I've had two separate conversations with two separate sports fans about how big of a deal this win was for U-32. It was the first time the Raiders beat the Solons in 12 years - and of all the years to maybe expect U-32 to do it, it wasn't this one. The Raiders have a first-year varsity goalie in Bailey Starr, but you wouldn't know it watching her. I've seen her play against Division-I Spaulding, and the kid is fearless. And they have this certain superstar who can show even the most casual of casual soccer fans - that'd be me - that the game really is beautiful. Her name is Emily George, and it was her corner kick that teammate Jazz Lockyer-Wills slipped past Solon goalie Tess Lawson - also a first-year varsity goalie, stepping in to fill the big shoes left when Caroline Dellipriscoli graduated this spring.

But for the most part, the Raiders a team built on youth - and therefore built more for tomorrow than today. This team will clearly be one to reckon with in a year or so, but on Wednesday night, it got a head start.

I left a message for Raider coach Steve Towne in the hope that he could shed some more light on this moment for his team, but I hadn't yet heard back from him before I wrote this. Either way, I can imagine he'd talk about how much it meant for this young team to take down a local - and state, for that matter - giant, nevermind their rivals. Montpelier has been - and will continue to be, for sure - a power in the local soccer scene, and this loss is no knock to the Solons at all. It's just good for local soccer to have such drama unfold mid-season to keep fans and players on their toes.

I imagine this to be a turning point for these Raider girls - they've showed they can play with the big girls, and that's not a bad feeling to have going into the stretch run of the regular season.

Deadline pressures last night forced our staff to find the information as quickly as possible. This is my small way of showing the Raiders their win is not being short-changed. It has certainly made a soccer rookie like myself want to know more and what happens next. Big wins can lead to big letdowns - but the opposite is true, too - big wins can be season-changers. Which will it be for U-32?

-Anna Grearson

Solons, Spartans are my Game of the Week

I rarely preview games, only because it's a slippery slope - once you start, you have to keep going and preview everything. Trust me.

But because the Montpelier football team is playing on Thursday - thereby missing the weekly football preview our sister paper, The Rutland Herald, does - and because the Solons are such a big story on so many levels this fall, I gotta say something before their Week 6 contest.

The top four teams in Divisions II and III make the playoffs (top eight in Division I), and right now both Montpelier and its Thursday-night-lights opponent, Winooski, are on the outside looking in on the Division III tournament. But both teams are in the front row of viewers.

Montpelier sits in the No. 5 slot while Winooski is a bit further back but still in a good spot in No. 8.

The Solons are 3-2 while the Spartans are 2-3. Both lost last week on the road, but the Solons' loss wasn't as straight forward as it sounds. They were scheduled to play on Thursday against Windsor at Hartford (Windsor's field is trashed from Irene still) - another key matchup in terms of the playoff picture - but that was postponed by rain to Friday. The two teams played all by 8 minutes and change of the game on Friday before a lightning delay eventually suspended the game. They resumed the game at that point later in the weekend, with Montpelier up by five, 39-34. Windsor went on the offensive in the remaining 8-plus minutes to record a comeback victory. The Spartans lost at Mill River.

Add to that the emotional toll on the Solons - both players and coaching staff - from the Week 4 victory over MSJ that saw junior Dylan Mercadante suffer what developed into a horrific injury. I spoke via text with Montpelier coach John Murphy yesterday, asking him about Mercadante's weekend. Murphy replied that Dylan probably had a better weekend than he - Murphy - did, and was finally moved from the ICU at Fletcher Allen to a private room. The Solons will don No. 6s on their jerseys - Dylan's number, sewn on by a football mother prior to the Windsor game - at Thursday's home game against the Spartans.

Montpelier averages 23.4 points per game while giving up an average of 18.2. The Spartans also average a win, putting up an average of 31.4 points while allowing an average of 27.6 points. Both teams will play their last two regular-season games on the road: Montpelier at Mill River and at Oxbow, Winooski at Mount Abraham (which Montpelier beat 13-6 in Week 1) and at BFA-Fairfax (which beat Montpelier 58-28 in Weej 2). The Solons are home against Woodstock next Friday while the Spartans will also spend Week 7 at home on Friday night, against Oxbow.

Both teams recorded big wins over MSJ - their only shared opponent so far. Montpelier won 48-0, like I said above, and Winooski won 51-14.

I will be at the Montpelier-Winooski game Thursday night and will Tweet live updates, so be sure to follow me @annagrearson.

-Anna Grearson