The Snow is Gone: Winter In A Recap

This winter had some exciting highlights for Plymouth State College sports teams. All teams performed well and many individual players made significant contributions to their teams.

This year’s women basketball team had an incredibly successful season, finishing the season with a record of 23 wins and 8 losses. Their 23 wins mark the fourth straight 20-win season and also set a school record for most wins in a season, men or women. Their season also included clinching the Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference New England Championship for the second year in a row. The game was a nail-biter that came down to the last second, with the Panthers holding strong and outlasting Colby-Sawyer College 77-73. The Panthers are only the second team in the conference’s history to win back-to-back championships, and it hasn’t been done since Colby College won the championship in 1984 and 1985.

This year’s men and women’s skiing team did very well, advancing all the way to nationals, sending four men and five women to compete in Lake Tahoe, California. The men placed fifth in the combined alpine standings and the women tied for sixth with Rocky Mountain College. Junior Whitney Swaffield finished second out of seventy-five skiers in the giant slalom and the slalom, finishing second overall. Swaffield has performed very solidly this season, finishing in the top six in eleven out of twelve races this season. Three freshmen finished in the top twenty-sixth in the giant slalom, with Chantelle Heroux, Kristy Hoch, and Kelsey Real finishing sixteenth, twenty-fifth, and twenty-sixth, respectively. Sophomore Tyler Barlow finished strong for the men, placing eighth in the giant slalom and seventh overall. He has placed in the top ten in every race this season. Junior Garrett Lashar, freshman Rob Kiely, and junior Brent Grygiel finished twentieth, twenty-fourth, and twenty-eighth for the men as well.

The men’s basketball team also performed well this season, finishing the season with the second most wins in school history with twenty-one wins and eight losses. The end of the season was the most disappointing for the Panthers, losing in the finals of the Little East Conference and in the quarterfinals of the ECAC. The finals of the LEC was a heartbreaker for the Panthers, losing 63-65 in the final seconds of the game as Western Connecticut sunk a jumper with 3.3 seconds left to seal the win. Major highlights of the season included senior Kenny Stewart scoring his 1,000 career point during a win against Keene State, and sophomores Nick Pelotte and Anthony Olglesby leading the team, averaging eighteen and fifteen points per game, respectively.

Ice hockey finished up the season with five wins, twelve losses, and five ties. Forwards Rory Nickerson, Dennis Kane, and Kyle Poirier were the team’s leading scorers with nineteen, eighteen, and seventeen goals respectively this season. All the goalies also performed very well this season, each of them posting a seventy-five percent or better save percentage. Their season led the team to an ECAC Tournament Northeast Conference bid, but unfortunately they lost to Western New England College 6-4.

Wrestling also had a successful season, finishing the season with a 4-9 record as well as finishing a strong third at the New England College Conference Wrestling Association Championships. Dan Moskowitz and Nate Kittredge captured the New England titles in their division, Moskowitz winning at 149 pounds and Kittredge winning at 184 pounds. Both earned bids to the NCAA Division III National Championships, but unfortunately Moskowitz was eliminated after he lost his opening match and the back draw and Kittredge was forced to withdraw from the tournament because of a knee injury that he suffered at New Englands. Shaun Cleary, Rich Moskowitz, and Kittredge led the Panthers this season, each of them posting over twenty wins.

The swimming and diving team also finished the season strong with a sixth place finish at New Englands. They ended their season at the .500 mark with five wins and five losses. Outstanding athletes for this season included swimmers Scarlette Scarborough, Annabelle Winters, and Tessa Ferrario, as well as divers Krit Kearins, Becky Huntington, and Jen Crescenzi. Scarborough set three school records at New Englands, breaking her own records as well as records that hadn’t been touched in years. Winters was a solid performer all season for the Panthers, routinely capturing her events in the distance freestyle. Ferrario was also solid this season, taking the breaststroke events in most of the season’s meets. Kearins captured the New England title on the one-meter board with a school record of 292.85, and Huntington took the title on the three-meter board with a school record of 349.25 points. Crescenzi performed solidly all season and finished fourth on the one-meter and third on the three-meter board. Huntington was also named Diver of the Meet and Head Coach Al Switzer was awarded the Charles Batterman Diving Coach of the Year. The award is named after Charles Batterman, former legendary head coach of MIT and personal mentor to Switzer. It was very clear to all present that Switzer was deeply moved to receive the honor.

The winter season was very solid for all Plymouth State athletes, and the team efforts were always 100 percent. Every player gave every game and met everything they had, and their efforts were not in vain. All teams were successful in their ventures and look forward to even better seasons in the following years.