Keep an eye on these teams in stretch run

Here are some teams to watch as the high school spring season hits the home stretch and the postseason looms.

In softball, Middletown and HaleRay continue to roll. The Class LL Blue Dragons have won nine in a row and are 15-1 and the Class S Little Noises are 152. Both are ranked No. 4 in their respective classes and if they stay in the top four, they will have home games through the quarterfinal round of the state tournament.

Both have big games this week as Middletown travels to once-beaten Seymour (161) on Thursday and Hale-Ray hosts unbeaten Griswold (16-0) Wednsday at 7 p.m. at Lou Milardo Field.

Mercy is 7-8 and needs one win to clinch a Class L tourney berth, but it may not be necessary. Even with a sub-.500 record, the Tigers are ranked No. 20 in what appears to be a weak bottom half of the Class L field and will almost certainly make the top 32 teams. Eight wins guarantees a berth, but the CIAC allows the top 32 teams in regardless of record.

In baseball, here is something no one expected: Middletown (511) has a shot to make the Class L state tournament. The Dragons kept that hope alive with a stunning 7-6 win over Wethersfield Friday. Wethersfield is 12-3 and has been flirting with the Top 10 all season. But things on paper don’t always translate onto the field.

After losing nine in a row to open the season, the Dragons have won five of seven and currently are ranked No. 32 in Class L, the last tourney spot.

To be sure, with games with New Britain, Berlin, Rocky Hill and Enfield left, getting to a clinching eight wins will be difficult, but it’s May 15 and the Dragons are alive.

Xavier is also a long shot. The Falcons, after climbing to within a game of .500, have lost four in a row and at 6-11 are sitting at No. 35 in Class LL, which is out of the money. It’s a tall order for

Xavier to win two of three to guarantee a berth. The Falcons play at Fairfield Prep and North Haven before closing the season at home with Shelton Friday.

If the Falcons get a road split, then Friday’s 7 p.m. game will be the tourney decider.

Vinal Tech, the only baseball team in the city with a winning record at 9-8, is in the Class M tournament. Hale-Ray, at 7-10, needs one win to clinch a berth.

Both MHS track teams are 4-0 in dual meets. The Middletown boys are expected to be a force in Class L. The teams first will participate in the Central Connecticut Conference championship meet on May 24 at 7Willow Brook Park in New Britain.

Xavier’s lacrosse team is in the state tournament with a 9-4 record.

MHS Ultimate wins title

Middletown High’s Ultimate Frisbee team won the 2017 state championship Saturday, defeating the Hotchkiss School 10-9 in the championship game. MHS beat Marianapolis Prep 15-2 in the opening game, then beat The Watkinson School 11-3 to earn the title match.

Xavier was 1-2 in the tourney.

Ultimate is organized at the state, regional and national level. It is not a CIAC sanctioned sport, but Middletown High recognized it as a full varsity sport several years ago and a couple of years later, Xavier did the same.

Although not CIAC-recognized, the local teams comply with all CIAC/ school regulations relative to eligibility and the like.

The sport is unique at two levels in that both both boys and girls can play on the same team and it is played without game officials. One of the guiding principles of Ultimate is sportsmanship and all disputes must be settled by players — not coaches — from both teams on the field before the game can continue.

Trevor Charles, who is also the boys and girls swim coach and is an alumnus of MHS and Marist College, from which he graduated in three years and at which he both swam and played Ultimate, founded the MHS team and is the coach.

Charles also organizes Middletown’s highly-regarded Diversity Day program which featured over 40 speakers this past Friday at MHS. He teaches social studies at the school and is also the adviser of the school’s strong GayStraight Student Alliance. He and his wife Nicole and their three children live in Middletown.

For both the enormous good work Charles does and for the success of the Ultimate program at the high school, Charles and the MHS Ultimate Frisbee team win this week’s Way To Go Award.

Cromwell/Portland football

Randell Bennett is the new football coach at Cromwell/Portland. He is an alumnus of Cromwell High and his collegiate background includes Valley Forge Military College and Grambling State University. He had a five-year career playing Arena Football with the Harrisburg Stampede and the Kansas City Command.

He has been the varsity offensive line and junior varsity head coach at Cromwell the last four years.

The Panthers’ tentative schedule has been released. It shows C/P opening up at Rockville on Friday, Sept. 8 at 6:30 p.m. Rockville dropped out of the Central Connecticut Conference after being hit about the head and shoulders for years.

The Panthers’ home opener is with North Branford on Sept. 15 at 6:30 p.m. They have other home games with Lewis Mills (Sept. 22), Old Saybrook/ Westbrook (Oct. 20) and Valley Regional/Old Lyme (Oct. 27). The other six games are on the road including the season finale on Thanksgiving at Rocky Hill at 10 a.m.

Kids on TV

Noah Finz, after spending 19 years with Channel 8 in New Haven, is the mover and shaker for the ‘Connecticut Sports Now’ show that airs on Frontier Channel 1600 Monday through Friday at 10:30 p.m.

The show features video from high school games from across the state and is based at Sacred Heart University. Finz said that the program is part of the Vantage Sports Network and the mission is to promote positive things in the state concerning high school sports.

“It’s not our bread-andbutter to do hard news,” said Finz. “Our approach allows us to promote things. Frontier believes it is crucial to expand its base and to show that ‘we care’ and there’s no better way to do that than to show what kids are doing.”

The station also has made arrangements with many college sports information directors across the state and at other times in the broadcast day rebroadcasts events from colleges that were done by the colleges themselves.

The effort dovetails with the curriculum at Sacred Heart and students from the university do onair work, operate cameras and work in the control room.

“We have five undergrads every night in the control room, we have two who are director and producer and we have five others gathering contacts and working to get on-air,” said Finz.

Finz and former WFSBTV sports reporter Mark Robbins do a lot of the field work, going to games for video, then coming back to the station for the nightly broadcasts.

“Mark and I get to four to six games every day,” said Finz. “We try to cover all sports and get to all parts of the state.”

Several Middletown High, Xavier, Mercy and other area high school athletic events have been featured on the station, which is available only to Frontier subscribers.

“The concept was for Frontier to offer a service to their subscribers,” said Finz. He went on to say that while numbers are hard to nail down, the current estimate is that 3,000 tune in each night. Frontier has a base of 190,000 subscribers in the state.

Frontier supplies the funding and Sacred Heart provides the facility, but Frontier doesn’t control the on-air operations according to Finz.

“I’m having so much fun with this,” said Finz. “Nineteen years at Channel 8 was enough; I needed to do something else. This is what I want to do.”

Going to college

Among the Middletown High athletes going to college are track and field athletes Drue Marino and Jalen Coleman to Southern Connecticut State, soccer/ basketball/track athlete Jen Barbour to the University of Connecticut, volleyball/indoor track athlete Brianna Belin and volleyball player Jenna Dickes to St. John’s, baseball player/ swimmer Stephen Lombardo to Penn State, baseball player A.J. Mallett to Oral Roberts University and football/baseball player Jay Nanfito to Western New England.

More announcements from area schools next week.

Here and there

Congratulations to Xavier’s Matt Wyzykowski who took first place in the discus at the Greater Hartford Invitational track meet Saturday ... also congrats to star Mercy distance runner Bridgid Selfors who won the 3200 meter run in the same meet.

The Southern Connecticut Conference postseason begins today with the sectional track and field meets ... the SCC championship meet in which Xavier and Mercy will have qualifiers, will be May 23 at Lyman Hall in Wallingford ... the baseball, softball and tennis playoffs begin next week, the lacrosse playoffs begin Saturday and the volleyball playoffs — Xavier is 7-9 — begin May 24 ... the SCC golf championships are May 30.

Raye Brookes, the wife of Haddam-Killingworth coach Mark Brookes and the Cougars’ No. 1 fan, was upset with my characterization of Red Sox fans and Fenway Park in this space last Monday ... no doubt she is right when she says the vast majority of Sox fans are good people ... however, we can’t ignore the facts that happened with the racist taunts towards Orioles’ outfielder Adam Jones — more than 30 fans were thrown out of Fenway that night — the racist characterization of an Anthem singer by a fan in a subsequent game at Fenway, and even more significant, the remarks by Yankees’ pitcher CC Sabathia that racist taunts “are expected” at Fenway and that it is the only park in which he has been called the ‘N’ word ... taken together the events constitute a powerful indictment.

Some months ago I wrote about the risks posed by testicular cancer and how it is a disease that is not talked about much ... last week, 26year old Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Jameson Taillon underwent surgery for that illness ... to repeat, it is the most common solid tumor in men ages 15-35 ... guys in that age group — and dads of teenage sons — should talk about it, and learn how to selfexamine and what to look for ... caught early, it is almost always curable ... yeah, I know it’s uncomfortable for many dads to talk about sex organs with their sons, but I would offer that death is a bit more uncomfortable.

Typo — or just my stupid — error in last week’s column said that Xavier opens its football season on Sept. 9 with Norwich Free Academy ... it’s actually Sept. 8, a Friday at Palmer Field.

The spring postseason is fast-approaching and Middletown will be the site of some big events ... the baseball championships will be held at Palmer Field June 9 and 10 ... the four title games usually bring 4,000 to 5,000 folks to town and the local Legion Baseball program benefits enormously from concession stand sales and yes, there is a bit of a spillover economic benefit to businesses along Route 66, too.

There will also be a semi-final double header on Tuesday, June 6, at Palmer Field.

There will be state championship track meets at Rosek-Skubel Stadium at Middletown High later this month ... the Class L boys and girls championship event will be held Tuesday, May 30 and the Class MM meet will be Wednesday, May 31.

Westbrook’s and Brown University’s Sam Grigo was named to the Academic All-American team for the Northeast ... Grigo played against Middletown in Legion baseball ... he plays right field for Brown and hit .313 with 47 hits and 21 RBI with 24 runs scored ... he had a 15game hitting streak, the longest on the team this season.

Middletown Post 75 announced that its American Legion Baseball season tickets are on sale ... it remains a bargain ... $30 admits the entire family to all regular season home games ... right now, there are 27 home games, 14 of which are Zone 3 games.

I understand that all government entities try to stretch every tax dollar ... but when there is an event at Palmer Field, it seems to me that there should be a city employee on duty throughout the event.

Thursday night at the Portland vs. Middletown game, there was no one on duty to turn the lights on ... the worker had other duties in the city and left the park without throwing the switch ... it proceeded to get dark — it’s a rule — and there was no one there ... it was almost 7:30 p.m. before the lights were activated by someone other than that employee ... I wonder, what happens if there is a sudden shower? ... who puts the tarps on the field? ... what happens if there is flooding in the rest rooms? ... or if some other unforeseen event occurs?

This is not a knock on the employees, who are uniformly terrific, but rather a question about management’s job assignments.

There were 175 fans, two teams, umpires and assorted personnel ... maybe 250 persons in the park ... but no city employee in a city-owned and operated facility for an extended period of time ... makes no sense to me.

Speaking of Palmer Field, Public Works/Parks Director Bill Russo said the renovations at Palmer Field will begin after the baseball season ... Russo is meeting with Hartford Yard Goats’ officials this week to discuss some changes and how to go about them.

He wants the infield dirt and track to be redcolored and there are plans to redesign the entrance and to install seats with backs throughout the baseball grandstand ... “Palmer has gotten tired,” he said. “The playing surface is great, the lights are great and the new scoreboard is great, but it’s time we put some money into the facilities that surround the field.

“I want to continue to attract tournaments.”

The money is available through the referendum for park improvements that was approved last year by city residents ... the last major work at Palmer Field was done in 1987.