Swampscott Athletics meet their match in Tournament

The girl’s field hockey and volleyball teams and the girl’s and boy’s soccer teams culminated their impressive seasons this month with a chance at division championships.

Advancing to tournament with a record of 13 wins, 3 losses, and 2 ties, the field hockey team won their first tournament game against Wayland on Wednesday, September 30.  The team then continued on to play Tewksbury on Friday, November 1.  Swampscott was the favorite going into the second tournament game, having beat a team by 5 goals that Tewksbury only beat by 1. 

In regards to her team’s capability, starting left midfielder and Swampscott High School junior Samantha Sinrich said: “We have defensive players that are able to go up and play offense when we’re leading in a game and same for offense— they can play defense.  A few of the defensive players have even scored goals.”

Despite the strong efforts of the entire team, the field hockey girls disappointingly lost against Tewksbury with the final score reading 2-1.

The volleyball team finished their season with 11 wins and 8 losses, placing them in a tournament game against one of the top teams in the state, Arlington Catholic.  “Although I have complete confidence in my team, they are a very strong opponent.  But I hope we’ll win” said varsity captain and outside hitter junior Gina Asipenko. 

Like the field hockey team, the volleyball team lost with an overall score of 3-0; however, the scores of the individual games were 25-13, 25-6, and 25-18.

The girls soccer team finished their season with a record of 9 wins, 5 losses, and 4 ties, advancing them into a tournament game against Triton on Saturday, November 2.  Going into the game the starting varsity goalie and all-star, junior Samantha Rizzo said: “We scrimmaged them earlier this year as our first scrimmage as a team and we controlled the play, so I think our chances are pretty good.  However, we can’t go into it thinking it’s an easy game.”

In an upsetting loss, the final score of the game was 1-0 after two ten minute overtimes and two rounds of penalty kicks. “As a goalie it’s always heartbreaking to lose in penalty kicks to a team you are equally as good as.  It was probably the worst way to see the season come to an end but I can honestly say this team was the strongest high school soccer team I’ve been on in my three years” said Rizzo.

Similarly, the boy’s soccer team played Bedford in a tournament game on Friday, November 1, and lost 5-1.  However, outside midfielder junior Shea Nugent said “We had four freshman and they all started so we were pretty young, so I think we did better than expected.  The senior captains would have wanted us to do a little better, but I think we played up to our potential.”