The No. 10 St. Mary’s hockey team suffered a heartbreaking loss on Saturday afternoon after a thrilling game against No. 7 Arlington. St. Mary’s left it all on the ice but it was an overtime goal by Arlington to win 4-3.
The Spartans found themselves down 2-0 after the first period and it could have been more if it wasn’t for some brilliant saves from goaltender Matthew Smith Jr.
In the second period, the Spartans found their rhythm. After a cross-check penalty, St. Mary’s only needed 18 seconds on the power play to get a goal back. Cam McGonalgle from the right circle fired a shot that found the back of the net to make it 1-2.
Then with just 33 seconds remaining in the period, Kalen Huddle leveled the score going into the final period.
In the third period, St. Mary’s scored its third unanswered goal thanks to a shot from Stephen Nason with 3:50 left in regulation.
Unfortunately for St. Mary’s, with just 16 seconds left in the game Arlington found a late equalizer to force overtime.
In overtime with 4:19 left on the clock Quinlan McNulty-Lu scored the game-winner to advance.
No. 7 Arlington will play top-seeded St. John’s Prep in the next round.
BOYS HOCKEY
No. 2 Medfield 4
No. 15 Lynnfield 1
The Pioneers couldn’t pull off the upset on Saturday evening. The Warriors got out to a fast start leading 2-0 after the first period.
Medfield added two more goals in the third period before Owen Considine found the back of the net to get Lynnfield on the board.
Michael Marengi produced 26 saves for the Pioneers in the final game of the season.
No. 2 Medfield moves on to play No. 7 Melrose in the Elite 8.
No. 5 Winthrop 3
No. 12 Norwell 2
The Vikings left it late but got the job done against Norwell.
Norwell led 2-1 in the third period with under five minutes remaining after a Cam Long goal. Fortunately for Winthrop, good teams know how to rally when it needs to.
Winthrop found two goals in the final few minutes to lift them past Norwell to advance to the Elite 8.
No. 5 Winthrop will face either No. 4 Littleton or No. 13 Boston Latin Academy.
GIRLS HOCKEY
No. 5 Archbishop Williams 7
No. 12 Peabody-Lynnfield-North Reading 1
Despite the heavy defeat, the PLNR girl’s hockey team competed until the final buzzer. The hosts went up early and didn’t look back.
PLNR found themselves down 2-0 before Eleni Spack reacted to a rebounded shot from Shirley Whitmore and Spack tucked in the goal to make it 1-2.
However, Archbishop Williams had too much firepower and they advanced to the Elite 8 where they will face either No. 4 North Andover or No. 20 Shawsheen Tech.
WRESTLING
Saugus High School’s Anna Felico came up a little short at the 2025 MIAA Girls All-States Championships wrestling meet on Saturday at Methuen High School.
Felicio, the reigning MIAA Division 1 girls champion in the 107-pound weight class, finished runner-up, losing the final to top-seeded Samantha Bertini of Ludlow 20-5 in a technical fall (4:28).
But there is good news – with her runner-up finish, Felico qualified for the New England Interscholastic Championship at Providence Career and Technical School on March 8-9. She is the first female in the history of the Saugus-Peabody program to advance to the New England meet.
The Lynnfield-North Reading wrestling team placed one wrestler and scored 17 points to finish 44th out of 91 teams at the MIAA All-State Tournament on Friday and Saturday at Methuen High School.
St. John’s Prep placed four wrestlers and finished fourth with 97.5 points. The team title was a tight two-way race with Shawsheen topping the field with 132.5 points, just ahead of runner-up Central Catholic who finished with 130 points.
James Fodera was the top performer for the Black and Gold, finishing fifth in the 190-pound weight division, thereby becoming the first LNR wrestler to place in two All-State tournaments.
The Prep had one winner in Braedon Goes (4-0), who won the 126-pound weight division. He pinned Ryan Gomes of Ludlow (1:14) in the Round of 16, then pinned Michael Conover of North Attleboro in another first-period pin (1:17). In the semifinals, he defeated Alex Javier of Somerset Berkley in a 12-4 major decision, then clinched gold with a 4-1 decision over Nathan Sayers of Xaverian in the championship match.
James Lally (144) and Alex Bajoras (285) finished second in their respective weight classes. Lally (3-1) cruised through the first three rounds only to fall to Aidan Baum of Milford in the final, 13-5.
Bajoras (3-1) sailed through his first three bouts with pin wins only to lose the championship match to Thomas Brown of Chelmsford in a second-period pin in 3:04.
Will Lavalee finished sixth in the 150-pound division. Domenico Ternullo (215) finished 1-2 but did not place.
By virtue of their top-six finishes, Fodera, Goes, Lally, Bajoras, and LaValee secured spots in the 60th Annual New England Interscholastic Wrestling Championship on March 8-9 at the Providence Career and Technical Institute in Providence, RI.
For Marblehead/Swampscott its season came to an end. Liam O’Brien wrestled at 132 pounds. O’Brien had to face the Division 3 state champion from Wakefield where he lost 7-0. In his final match of the season, O’Brien faced off against Batista of Worcester Tech, who had soundly defeated Liam last week 17-1. Liam closed the gap a bit, losing 6-2, ending his junior year season. Liam finished the season with a 41-7 record, while only being pinned once this year.
Mason Hinshaw wrestled for the final time repping the Black and Blue. Despite various injuries, Hinshaw competed at a high level and narrowly lost (11-9) to Prep’s Ternullo. Hinshaw ends his high school career with 139 wins in four seasons, good for second on our all-time list just behind O’Brien.
TRACK AND FIELD
Marblehead’s Nathaniel Assa had a meet to remember. The Magician took home the gold medal in the 2-mile with a personal best of 9:04.60.
Assa’s teammate Jacob Szalewicz ran a personal best of 2:30.38 in the 1000m and finished third.
On the girls’ side, Paige Tredwell and Elise Burchfield of Marblehead finished 17th and 21st respectively in the high jump.
Peabody’s Evan Bedard, a Stonehill College commit, finished third in the long jump (23-00.50)
St. Mary’s star Kelsey Kwiatek placed 23rd in both the mile and the 1000m at the New England Championships. In the mile, Kwiatek crossed the finish line with a 5:21 time, in the 1000m, her time was 3:16.
