Valley plays state game with heavy hearts
GLOVERSVILLE, N.Y. » The sunglasses on Mike Vellucci’s face kept the tears streaming down his face out of view, but did little to hide the emotion permeating through his sniffles, his headin-hands body language, and the hugs he gave to ever person that offered one.
In each hand he held one cleat. On the left he wrote, “This one’s for you”. On the right said, “RIP Willy”, followed by the date of his death. Hoosic Valley’s season had come to an end with a 1-0 loss to Ticonderoga Thursday in the first round of the Class C state playoffs.
It was painful for a grieving team and community looking for normalcy after HV senior
Will Rowe was killed in a car accident just more than 24 hours prior.
The season-ending loss hurt like any loss hurts. But this loss didn’t just elicit tears. For Vellucci and his several of his teammates, the loss, and the emotions of the past two days poured out.
“I wanted nothing more than to win this game for Willy,” Vellucci said, before breaking down once again.
The game itself was one disappointment after another. The only run scored on an error by catcher Blake Wiegert. He threw the ball into the outfield after a wild pitch, allowing the runner to score in the third inning. In the sixth, a line drive would-be double was snared out of the air by a Ticonderoga player to kill a rally. In the seventh, the game ended on groundout that the runner appeared to beat.
Jon Colligan pitched a compete game, allowing zero earned runs. The senior walked to the dugout after the loss, saying through tears of his own that he should have done more — even though there wasn’t much else he could do.
“Anything like (Will’s death), you’re not going to rebound in 24 hours,” Colligan said. “We did our best. Came out here and gave it our all. Try to give it all for the community. We know that they have our backs. We just fell short today.”
The game-ending groundout left Hoosic Valley and the fans that made the near two-hour drive to watch it in stunned silence. The first base coach fruitlessly argued the call for a moment. The head coach, George Brooks, just put his head down and walked back to the dugout. He later said he believed his team could have played better.
The team met in right field after the game, and Brooks had to console an inconsolable team. Players had their arms around one another. Others put their faces in their hands. It was the end of a dream season. A run for a senior class that has won the Section II title every year they’ve been on the team. Brooks had coached some of them for seven years. It was the last time they’d take the field together.
But the game had greater implications than a baseball season. Bigger than a win. Bigger than a loss. Bigger than a high school career. It was a game wrapped up in life and death. A game for a community grieving with the lost life of someone they knew so well.
“Baseball and life,” senior Tom Madigan said, “Those are two different things.”
The sadness of a season’s end and the tragedy of a lost life were at the forefront on Thursday. Will Rowe was a soccer player at Hoosic Valley. He was going to graduate on the same day as his 18th birthday later this month. Then he crashed the car he was driving while taking his brother to school. And a young life was painfully lost.
When the season’s final talk was over. After Brooks had said his final words. After Madigan had addressed the team as well, there wasn’t anything left to do. They all stood up, but none of them walked back to the dugout. They all just began to hug each other.
Not quick hugs — the kind that express affection without the emotion behind it. These were long hugs.
They were lifting each other up. That was all they could do.
“We definitely put the community up there in this one, with the the tough time we’ve been going through at our school,” said senior Jimmy Burnell, whose face had been reddened by 15 minutes of non-stop crying. “We just wanted to come here and get a win. We fell a little short.”