Hurricane Watch: Hoosac Boys, Girls Basketball Were Story of 2015

In 2015, Berkshire County produced two high school state champions, nine Western Mass champs and more than a dozen sectional runners up.

 

But there was just one Game of the Year, and it came very early on.

 

On March 11, the Hoosac Valley boys basketball team survived two overtimes to knock off Uxbridge in the state semi-finals at Springfield's MassMutual Center.

 

Then-junior Jameson Coughlan scored on a baseline inbounds play with 1.2 seconds on the clock to give the 'Canes a 54-52 win.

 

"He's a tough-minded kid," Hoosac coach Bill Robinson said. "We could have quit a few times, but we just don't go away. We're just learning how to win games now. We're young. We're still juniors. It's pretty amazing right now."

 

It was the third buzzer-beater of the game. Uxbridge put back an offensive rebound at the end of regulation to force the first OT, which ended when Hoosac sophomore J.P. Levesque hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer to make it 50-50.

 

A quick Google search reveals that games with a trifecta of buzzer beaters do occur from time to time. But that's what you see when you search the world wide web.

 

The reality is that for most of those in attendance that day in Springfield, it was a once-in-a-lifetime result.

 

Making it extra special for the Hoosac boys: It came on the same day the Hoosac girls won their second straight state semifinal.

 

The twin success of the Hoosac Valley basketball programs was definitely the high school sports story of the year in the Berkshires.

 

If that was Story No. 1, Story "1A" had to be the stellar year in boys sports at Mount Greylock, which accounted for one of the state titles and three of the sectional crowns.

 

Hoosac's boys and girls basketball teams took very different routes to Worcester's DCU Center and the state title game.

 

Robinson's boys went 13-7 in the regular season won its three Western Mass games by a combined nine points: 52-48 over Mount Greylock, 45-42 over Drury and 48-46 over Wahconah.

 

Ron Wojcik's girls marched to their third straight sectional crown with an 18-2 regular season and wins by margins of 13, 10 and 26 points in the Western Mass tourney.

 

Unlike the Hoosac boys, who were dominated by underclassmen, the Hoosac girls bid adieu last winter to a trio of seniors -- Amber Lesure, McKenzie Robinson and Emily Rosse -- who were instrumental in the trio of banners hanging the Cheshire gym.

 

"These kids came in four years ago with no titles at Hoosac Valley, none," Wojcik said. "They've won three Western Mass. titles, got here [DCU Center] twice, it's just amazing what these kids have done for the school, community, and the program; you can't put it into words.

 

"You look up in the stands and you have all our third-, fourth-, fifth-, sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-graders are there watching this and they want to be a part of this too."

 

And despite those key losses to graduation, there is no reason to feel sorry for the 'Canes just yet. They have opened the 2015-16 season with a record of 5-1 heading into a key county showdown against Pittsfield on Tuesday.

 

Hoosac Valley was not the only school to open 2015 with some serious hardware. The winter season included a fifth-straight state championship for the Mount Greylock boys cross country ski team and a fourth straight state crown for the Drury High School bowlers.

 

And although the MIAA does not hold sectional championships in skiing, the Greylock girls' second-place showing to Eastern Massachusetts' Wellseley (not to mention their dominance of the Berkshire County league circuit) easily gives the Mounties claim to a quasi-Western Mass title.

 

Actual Western Mass titles were earned by three Berkshire County teams in the spring of 2015 -- two of them by Mount Greylock.

 

The Mounties' baseball team advanced all the way to the state championship game before bowing to St. Mary's of Lynn.

 

Mount Greylock's boys and Lenox's girls took home Western Mass tennis titles.

 

The county continued its winning ways in the high schools' "off season."

 

Among the highlights from the summer season were a trip to the Babe Ruth Baseball 15-year-old World Series for Pittsfield and a state Cal Ripken Baseball championship for the Lanesborough Bulldogs' 11-and-under team.

 

The high school gridiron produced plenty of highlights in fall 2015.

 

The season kicked off with a thrilling overtime win for Pittsfield in the city championship game against Taconic. But Taconic avenged that loss with a seven-point decision over its rival in the semi-final of the Western Mass playoffs.

 

Those playoffs once again were dominated by Berkshire County, which sent six of its nine teams to the post-season in three divisions.

 

Two of those teams -- Hoosac Valley in Division 5 and Lee in D6 -- won Western Mass crowns in sectional finals that featured county opponents on the opposite sidelines: Taconic against the Hurricanes and McCann Tech against Lee.

 

The county's other sectional titles this fall were claimed by the Mount Greylock boys and Lenox girls cross country teams. For the Mounties, it was a sixth straight sectional title. The Millionaires won a second straight crown in convincing fashion and went on to a second straight runner-up showing in the state championships.

 

On the college front, Williams College won 2015 Division III national titles in women's golf, women's tennis (an NCAA-record sixth straight), women's cross country and women's soccer. The golf and soccer national championships were the first for each program.

 

The big stories in MCLA sports this year included the inaugural season for the women's lacrosse program, the softball team's MASCAC title run and the women's volleyball team's 24-11 season, which included 13 straight wins and the best regular season record in the league.