Munemo, Hall Earn Athlete of the Week Honors

As the high school sports scene shifts to state tournament play this week, our iBerkshires.com/Southwestern Vermont Health Care Athletes of the Week have their teams poised to do some damage their respective brackets.

 

As one of just two seniors on a Lenox girls soccer team loaded with seventh-, eighth- and ninth-graders, Ella Hall has been a stalwart in goal for the Millionaires again this fall.

 

This past week, she posted her fifth shutout of the season, making five saves in a win over Mahar in the Western Massachusetts Class C quarter-finals.

 

One night later, she had 18 stops against a high-scoring, one-loss Mount Greylock side in the regional semi-finals.

 

But with a record of 9-7-2, Hall and the Millionaires will get new life on Wednesday when the seeds are announced for the upcoming Division 5 state tourney.

 

Thanks in part to a challenging schedule in the Grieve Division this fall, Lenox was sitting at No. 16 in the most recent MIAA in-season power rankings. If it holds that spot, the Millionaires will be home in the first round of the state playoffs.

 

George Munemo and the Mount Greylock boys soccer team know something about tough schedules.

 

The Mounties' 7-6-3 record came while playing against some of the top teams in Western Mass. Their league, the Churchill Division, includes five teams that will be playing in state tourney brackets: three in Division 4, one in D3 and one in D2.

 

Division 5 Mount Greylock entered Friday ranked 11th in the commonwealth.

 

Munemo scored a second-half goal Friday night to help beat McCann Tech in the Western Massachusetts Class C semi-finals, giving the Mounties one more tuneup before the state tournament. Mount Greylock will play Ware on Wednesday for the regional title in a game that will not count toward state tournament seeding.

 

Earlier in the week, Munemo converted a direct kick in the 70th minute to give Mount Greylock a 2-1 win at Smith Vocational in the Western Mass semi-finals.

 

The two playoff goals extended his team lead with 12 goals this season. The senior forward led the Mounties with seven goals as a junior in a campaign that went all the way to the D5 quarter-finals, where Mount Greylock lost a 1-0 heart-breaker.

 

The iBerkshires.com Athlete of the Week is sponsored by Southwestern Vermont Health Care.