In a busy week for the Boys and Girls swim and dive teams they competed on back-to-back nights.
The Girls beat Bedford 95-72 on Friday, January 5 and then turned right around and defeated a tough Westford Academy squad on Saturday, January 6 and won 97-80 for their third straight win. Both meets took place the Concord’s Beede Center, but the Saturday meet was a road trip for the Patriots as Westford Academy was the home team. WA has no home pool for competition and uses the Beede Center for home meets.
The teams had gone two-and-half weeks without a meet before swimming against Bedford. “We had some big swims today (vs. Bedford)” said CC head coach Matt Goldberg. “Eighty swimmers had their best times of the season.”
Against Bedford in individual events the following CC girls took first place. Sarah Nadzo in the 200-yard freestyle, Alana Leen in the 200-yard IM, winning by almost nine seconds. Tess Ward won the 50-yard freestyle. Junior Masie O’Donnell dominated in diving for the win. In the 100-yard butterfly Bea Turrettini edged teammate Caroline Hollywood for the win. The girls 100-yard freestyle was won by Elizabeth Reiling by seven seconds. In the Relay events the Patriots squads won the 200-yard medley with Lilly Soillis, Ainsley Haut, Caroline Hollywood Tess Ward bringing home eight points for the win.
First time qualifiers for the states were Hannah Baldini in 200 freestyle, Reese Philips and Lilly Soillis in the 200 IM, Phoebe Renyi and Caroline Hollywood in the 100 Butterfly, Ainsley Haut in the 500 freestyle and Alexander Sproule qualified for sectionals in the 500 freestyle. The boys 200 freestyle relay also qualified for states, putting all six relay teams for the Patriots in the states.
Against Westford Academy in their home water, the Patriots had individual wins by Bea Turrettini in the 200-yard freestyle and the 500-yard freestyle by 11 seconds, Alana Leen in the 200-yard IM by 12 seconds, Elisabeth Reiling won the 50-yard freestyle, The team of Lilly Soillis, Ainsley Haut, Elisabeth Reiling and Tess Ward won the 200-yard medley relay. The girls won the meet with a win in 200-yard freestyle relay as Alana Leen, Reese Phillips, Tess Ward and Bea Turrentini capturing the eight points for the win. Maisie O’Donnell stayed undefeated with her diving win.
For the boys team, it was a split weekend. On Friday, they beat Bedford 86-64 and on Saturday they lost inthe last event to Westford Academy. For the boys versus Westford, it came down to the 400-yard freestyle relay. Concord-Carlisle was ahead by two points going into the final event. A Patriots win would give them win the meet, if the A and B relay teams finished second and third the meet would end in a tie. In a back-and-forth race Westford pulled ahead down the stretch and won by less four seconds to clinch the 92-88 meet victory.
Against Westford, Emelen Lease won the 100-yard breaststroke and also earned points for the Patriots by finishing second in 200-yard IM, second on the 200-yard medley relay team and second in the 200-yard IM. Lucas Leonard won the 100-yard freestyle by .06 of a second. Noah Jina won the 100-yard butterfly and Cole Scafidi won the 500-yard freestyle. The 200-yard freestyle relay team of Noah Jina, Cale Barker, Andrew Hodges and Lease won by less than half a second. Thomas Stone stayed undefeated in diving with a win over Westford’s Jeremiah Small.
“It is tough to swim back-to-back meets.” Said CC head coach Goldberg. “We have a deep team,
especially on the girl’s side.” “Out depth allows us to rest swimmers.”
The boys were coming off a big 86-64 win over Bedford on Friday night.
The 200-yard medley relay team of Noah Caruso, Emlen Lease, Alexander Sproule and Andrew Hodges got the night started with a big win. Lucas Leonard won the 200-yard freestyle and Emlen Lease won the 200-yard IM. Andrew Hodges earned six points for his win in 50-yard freestyle and Noah Jina added six more points by winning the 100-yard butterfly. Thomas Stone, the lone male diver on the Concord-Carlisle team, won again.
Basketball
The Girl’s basketball team traveled to Boston Latin on January 5 and came home with their biggest win
on the season, 71-31. Senior captain Brooke Boyle celebrated her birthday by scoring 21 points to lead
the team. Junior captain Kaleigh Mutch held down the defensive fort with great communication and
leadership also contributing 10 points. Sophomore Nicole O’Reilly saw some varsity minutes with
highlights on offense (6 points) and defense and fellow sophomore Camila Bury was able to shut down
Boston Latin on defense.
“The team ran the transition game well” said assistant coach Caitlyn Brennan.
“We were able to dominate the offensive and defensive boards.”
With the win, the team improved to 3-2. This was the second game against Boston Latin in the young
season. The Patriots defeated Boston Latin 60-32 on December 27 at the Bob Bigelow Tournament at
Winchester High School. That win sent C-C to championship game against host Winchester. The Patriots
had a 22-18 lead at the half in the title game. A 6-0 run by Winchester gave the hosts the lead at 29-26 in the third quarter. Senior captain Brooke Boyle scored four points to help C-C cut the lead to 33-32, but hat was as close as the Patriots would get. Winchester put together a 15-0 run that spanned the third
and fourth quarters and put the game away as the Red and Black won 50-43. Boyle finished with a team-
high 13 points and was named to the all-tournament team.
Boy’s Basketball had a 1-1 week to begin 2024. They went on the road to Nashoba Regional and lost
46-45 in overtime. Senior captain Ben Paradis hit a pair of big three-pointers to keep C-C in the game in
overtime. The Patriots just could not get the right shot at the end. Paradise finished with 8 points, while
senior captain Jed Cain led the team with10. Senior captain Aaron Martin and senior Nick Charles each
finished with a team-high 8 rebounds.
The Patriots came home and, before a loud Hawaiian-shirt wearing crowd, put away Boston Latin 63-40.
The boys are now 3-4 and have won two of their last three games. The teams used a full-court pressure from the beginning to create turnovers and turned them into points. Martin scored 12 points and pulled down six rebounds to lead the Patriots. Ninth-grader Zach Wynn scored 8 points coming off the bench for his first career points.
Another big contribution off the bench was senior Rithvik Gaddam, who scored six points on
3-for-3 shooting, had two rebounds and a huge block. The points were his first career points.
“It was a great night for us” said assistant coach Dylan Pella.
Indoor Track and Field
Boys and Girls Indoor Track and Field teams competed on January 3 at New Balance. It was an
invitational meet so no team scores, but there were a lot of individual highlights for Concord-Carlisle.
- Elyjah Ramos bettered his Personal Record in the shot put by 3 feet. Lauren Zipoli her improved her state qualifying time to 8.99 in the hurdles. Jack Thomas also had a PR in the hurdles. In the 55M event
- Zion Atkinson, Gordon Hall, Mark Johnson, Brendan Joyce and Tricia Cronin all set PR. Claire Beckley qualified for states in the long jump.
- Jill Evans set a PR for the shot put by 2 feet. Alissa Bono won the 400M in 61.37. Brady Quayle and Pellin Turner both set PR in the mile.
- The 4x800M relay team of Charlie MacDonald, Luke Crounse, Sawyer Bout and Will Anstey were only :05 off of divisional qualifying.
- There was a MSTCA Freshman/Sophomore meet held on January 7 before the storm hit in which a few C-C athletes participated in. Ninth-grader Maria Chopas finished fifth in the 1000M to medal and qualify for states with a PR 3:14.75. Pelin Turner won the two mile in 12:12 and set a PR and also qualified for states. Ninth-grader Charlie MacDonald medaled with a 6 th place finish in the 2 mile.
- Also setting a PR and qualifying for states with a 10:14. Sawyer Bout and Luke Crounse both had mile PR. Sophomore Austin Calabro set a PR in the 1000M.
Girls Hockey
The Girls Hockey Team split the two games last week. They defeated Cambridge Ridge and Latin 5-4 on
Saturday January 6.
Ninth-grader Ava Thomas scored twice for the Patriots. Also scoring was ninth-
grader Nicole Atkins, senior Julia Lambert, and eight-grader Maddy Humber. Assisting on the goals was
Atkins with two, Humber, ninth-graders Abby Athanasoulas and Abby Adams. Junor goalie Crista Celi
was strong in net, especially in the decisive third period.
In the Newton South game, the Patriots lost 12-7 with eighth-grader Maddy Humber scoring six goals
