PEABODY — Saturday was a night full of celebration and reminiscing for the Bishop Fenwick community, as the school’s Athletic Hall of Fame gathered to induct seven new members — six individuals and one team — as the Class of 2021.
The seven inductees into the Class of 2021 were Colleen Corcoran ’16, Nick Bona ’14, Amy Pelletier ’11, Cara Linehan Buckwell ’01, Christopher Garofalo ’04, Stephen Czarnecki ’72 and the 1980 girls cross country team.
Corcoran, a Beverly native, will go down in Fenwick history as one of the school’s greatest three-sport athletes. A rare three-sport team captain in basketball, soccer and lacrosse, Corcoran helped lead the Crusaders to a 21-4 record and a basketball state championship in 2016. One of the all-time leaders in points and rebounds, Corcoran was named Catholic Central League MVP as a senior and earned all-star honors multiple times in both soccer and lacrosse.
Corcoran went on to play Division II basketball at LeMoyne College, where she’s fourth all-time in games played with 112. She currently serves as a graduate assistant coach at Div. I University of Albany, and her ultimate goal is to become a Div. I college coach or a WNBA coach.
Fenwick girls basketball coach Adam DeBaggis, who introduced both Corcoran and Pelletier during the ceremony, called her “the best all-around player I’ve ever coached.”
Bona served as the only three-year team captain in Fenwick football history, and many consider him to be one of, if not the greatest football player in the history of the school. The Peabody native was a rare four-year varsity starter for the Crusaders, and his senior season of 2013 will go down in history as one of the best ever for any player. Bona made 219 tackles as a senior, averaging nearly 25 tackles per game and en route to winning CCL MVP, Item Player of the Year, Salem News Player of the Year and Boston Globe Player of the Year. Oh, and he helped lead Fenwick to a Super Bowl victory.
Also a four-year starter and one-time MVP in baseball, Bona moved on to play football at Stonehill College — where he finished in the top 10 all-time in unassisted tackles with 132. Since graduating from Stonehill, Bona has served as a correctional officer for the Essex County Sheriff’s Department. He will begin at the police academy in November to pursue a career with the Lynn Police Department.
Pelletier holds the distinction of being one of only four women in school history to score 1,000 points for the basketball team, finishing with 1,219 points. A three-time CCL All-Star and one-time CCL MVP, Pelletier was also a two-time team captain and the South MVP of the 2011 Agganis All-Star Girls Basketball Game.
When she moved on to play at Stonehill, Pelletier broke the records for three-point field goals made in a season (87) and in a career (267), eventually finishing her college career with a 40 percent shooting percentage from deep. She finished her Stonehill career with more than 1,217 points to go along with 241 assists and 172 rebounds.
Linehan Buckwell was the lone inductee who was posthumously honored, as she died from lung cancer in 2017. A Melrose native who was a two-year captain for the Fenwick swim team, Linehan Buckwell earned a scholarship to the University of Maryland — where she captained the Div. I program in her senior year.
She later returned to Fenwick as the school’s swim coach, where she remained for 10 seasons. Linehan Buckwell was undefeated in dual meets during her career, wrapping things up with a 25-0 record. She was also named Boston Globe Div. 2 Swim Coach of the Year in 2016.
Garofalo, a Peabody native, was a four-year varsity hockey player and golfer for Fenwick. On the ice, Garofalo amassed 110 points — with 56 of them coming in his senior year to earn CCL MVP honors. He was a three-time all-star in both hockey and golf, and he won the Boston Bruins Sportsmanship Award during his senior year.
Garofalo went on to play four years of college hockey at Endicott College, where he graduated with a degree in finance. He later earned his Masters Degree in finance from Southern New Hampshire University.
Czarnecki has served as Fenwick’s track and cross country coach for a total of 106 seasons — which comes out to 648 meets. He is one of the winningest coaches in state history, putting up a win percentage of 82 percent. His 2017 and 2018 girls cross country teams took home state championships, and his 2017 team finished seventh at Nationals. In total, Czarnecki has coached 12 athletes and two teams to Nationals. Czarnecki, who has been a teacher and administrator at Fenwick since 1978, has earned a number of Coach of the Year accolades from The Daily Item, The Boston Globe and The Salem News over the years.
The 1980 girls cross country team will go down in history as the first ever Fenwick team to win an all-state cross country championship. The team went undefeated in dual meets during the 1980 season, winning the CCL and Division 3 titles before going on to win All-States. During that year, the team also won titles at Our Lady of Providence, the New England Catholics, the Northern Area Team Championship and the Knights of Columbus Holyoke Invitational Championship.
