MVU-Milton boys hockey recap

A couple of unrelated thoughts on the MVU boys hockey game with Milton on Wednesday night.

(To read the game story I wrote, you'll need to buy the St. Albans Messenger.)

First of all, how about Milton goalie Nikki-Lyn Lauziere (below)?

The junior - who I think its the only girl playing on a boys hockey team this winter - was nothing short of  incredible, stopping 46 shots against a high-flying T-Bird offense.

Sure, MVU lit the lamp five times, but it could have been 15 with as many quality scoring bids as they put forth.

Milton only has 14 players on its roster, but they all contribute and their conditioning is impressive as they seemed to keep pace with the deep and talented T-Birds for all 45 minutes.

The game was the second for the T-Birds without their charasmatic coach Jason Brace, a former BFA-St. Albans stud who took over last winter for long-time coach Kevin Spears (who was at the game in a Yankee hat - booo! - last night).

Brace will not coach the T-Birds the rest of the season and for good reason: he's being deployed to Afghanistan along with his mates in the Army National Guard.

Brace is a communications specialist and will be gone - but not forgotten - for about a year.

In his abscence, assistants Luc Choquette (himself a fine player for Spears back in the day) and John McDonald.

Choquette said he'll be in contact with his head coach - and good friend - throughout his deployment and that Brace is very proud to serve.

Choquette said the MVU players are also very proud of their coach and hope to see him off when he deploys in early January.

He's wishing Jason and the rest of those deploying in the weeks to come the best of luck in Afghanistan. I'm extremely proud of your service and sacrifice and I appreciate you doing more than your fair share to protect the liberties we all so often take for granted.

My thoughts go out, too, to the families they are leaving behind. You are unsung heroes in your own right. Stay strong and know that there are tons of people who are ready to help and support you in any way we can.

Top local sports team of 2009?

In case you haven't noticed, I'm mighty partial to polls.

(For those of you counting, National Lampoon's Christmas is the leader in the favorite Christmas movie poll and The Grinch and Rudolph are tied for the favorite Christmas special poll - you can still vote until Christmas Eve.)

But I digress ...

For my next poll I need a little help in selecting the choices.

The topic is top local sports team of 2009.

The only criteria is the team must be based in northwestern Vermont (no team further south than Milton or further east than Fairfax).

Here's are the teams I can come up with right off the top of my bald little head - in no particular order.

Milton girls soccer - Division II champs

Missisquoi boys soccer - Division II runners-up

BFA-Fairfax girls soccer - Division III runners-up

Milton Broncos 7/8 Youth Football - NVYFL runners-up

BFA-Fairfax boys basketball - Division III runners-up

BFA-St. Albans girls basketball - Division I runners-up

Missisquoi girls hockey - Division II runners-up

BFA-Fairfax softball - Division III runners-up

The plan is to post the poll on Monday, so if I have missed your favorite team or if you have another suggestion, please add your comments below and give me a good reason or two to put that team in the poll.

The best laid plans ...

For those looking for a fresh post tonight, I'm going to have to defer.

I occassionally work shifts designing sports pages at the Free Press and forgot that tonight was one of those shifts.

I might post after I get home around 1:30 a.m., but I may wait until later in the day.

For those who care about such things, I did upload the BFA girls hockey and MVU-Enosburg boys basketball photos, including a few JV shots.

My next assignment is Wednesday night when I cover MVU-Milton boys hockey for the Messenger.

Thanks for checking in!

Hornets and T-Birds and Comets, oh my!

The day didn't quite play out as expected, but then again they seldom do.

I was able to catch the first quarter of the MVU-Enosburg boys basketball game, but only after watching the overtime of a very exciting JV game. MVU, under substitute coach John Lumsden, saw his team fall behind by 15 early before rallying to win in OT.

The lengthy game meant that instead of getting to the start of the BFA-St. Albans-Hanover, N.H. girls hockey game at 3, I was still at the gym until 3:30.

However, I was able to get over to the rink in time to see the second period.

But I wasn't able to see much of the third because I was called away to attend to a flat tire on my wife's van. OK, I didn't actually attend to matter aside from venturing out in between periods to pick up my child while my wife was being rescued by some guardian angels who actually know how to change a tire.

Thanks guys, whomever you are!

I'll be taking a little break from the blog updates the next couple of days.

I'm shooting family and senior portraits at my studio tomorrow before working a desk shift at the Freeps. I'll be back at the Freeps again on Monday. In between, I'll try to get the photos from Friday and Saturday on the web and should be back blogging on Tuesday.

Thanks again to everyone who has taken the time to vote in the polls and visit the blog.

There have been over 100 unique visits to this blog this week - not earthshattering, but given the infrequency of my posts of late, a very nice response.

If you want to know when the blog is updated, friend me (Shawn Corrow) on Facebook or follow me on Twitter (scorrow).

Later

BFA wins, MVU falls

Took in a little of the MVU and BFA girls basketball games Friday night.

If you want some details, here's a link to the Free Press capsules on the games.

A couple of thoughts on the games ...

First, at MVU it was nice to see former Enosburg star Christiane Brown, who coaches North Country, which defeated the T-Birds.

Brown said her best returning player is lost for the season with an ACL tear, suffered when she was inadvertently undercut in a preseason game. Another expected contributor is also sidelined, recovering from an ACL tear that occurred in soccer season.

These losses may hamstring the Falcons in the long run this season, but against the T-Birds the ladies from Newport performed well.

It was also nice to meet Jim Fuller, the hard-working sports editor for the Newport Daily Express. Travelling to MVU on a Friday nights shows some real dedication to his craft.

At BFA there was a surprising large crowd given there was hockey at "The Doc" (my new name for the Collins-Perley rink in honor of Henry 'Doc' Tulip).

It's clear from what little I saw - I bailed after the first quarter - I didn't bring a flash and it's near impossible to shoot in the BFA gym without one - that these teams are both struggling to find new identities after lots of recent success.

I spoke to BFA coach Glenn Johnson away from the gym a few days back and he told me it's a different job completely without the likes of Tiffany Johnson, Nicole Lawton and the Garica twins on the court. Still, he said he's enjoying the challenge this season brings and he thinks there's potential for incredible growth as the season progresses.

Speaking of Tiffany, she's getting some playing time - sometimes a lot, sometimes not so much - as a freshman for the national-ranked Franklin Pierce women's basketball team.

At some point, I'll try track down some links to websites to the college teams where I know some Franklin County kids are playing in college. If you know of someone playing in college you'd like me to add to the list, please add a comment to this post - it's gets emailed to me automatically.

That's all I got for now - have another poll to post before I head out to shoot at the start of the Enosburg-MVU boys basketball game and the BFA-Hanover girls hockey game.