To start the week, the Silver Lake boys’ hockey team sat at 6-9-3 and for most teams, that would mean they would have to win out the rest of their season to make the playoffs. However, the pressure is off this time for the Lakers as they already earned their playoff spot last week.

The Lakers clinched a playoff spot last week as they shellacked Cardinal Spellman, 13-3, on Monday, Feb. 5. The win gave them a spot in the playoffs via the Sullivan Rule. This rule states that if a team has a .500 or better record against teams in their division or lower, then they will get into the playoffs. This rule also helped the Lakers to a playoff appearance last season, despite the team not enjoying as much success as a whole back then.

Since the Lakers are in Division 3 for hockey–the lowest division–they earned the spot since they were 5-3-1 against teams in their division to start the week. The non-league games have not been an issue for the Lakers, it’s just that they were 2-7-2 against Patriot League competition, most of which features Division 2 teams. If this is any indication, then the Lakers are in a pretty good spot as they gear up for the tournament.

After all, they did dominate Spellman and got freshman Gavin Belliveau his first career varsity win in net. Ryan Sullivan had a team-high three goals while Nick Solari, Bobby Guilford and Dave Marani each chipped in two goals apiece. The other goals of the game went to Alex Heffernan, Andrew Johnson, Sean McNeilly and John Evans. Needless to say, it was the most amount of goals the Lakers have put up this season.

The Lakers next game is a good test for them because they are set to face Sacred Heart of Kingston, a fellow Division 3 team who will likely make it to the playoffs. That one is set for Saturday, Feb. 17 (5:00 p.m. start time).

The Silver Lake wrestling team has enjoyed its share of ups and downs this season, but they have still enjoyed plenty of success this season and have a bright future ahead of them.

At the beginning of the month, the Lakers stood at 7-11 in their team meets on the season, but that does discount what they have accomplished this year. Not only do they compete in a tough division, but they have individuals on the team who have enjoyed a great deal of success in competitive tournaments thus far.

A prime example of this would be the team’s 120-pound wrestler Daniel Walsh coming in second at the Cape Cod Invitational tournament and third at the Marshfield Holiday Invitational over Christmas break in December. At the start of the month, he was 27-6 in his matches on the season.

Gavin Hamilton (182) and Kyler Baur (106 and 113), who have been starters all season, are also thriving. Hamilton was 20-11 and Baur was 20-14 this season as of February 1.

The team has also had some freshmen step into big roles such as Scott Snell (106) and Kyle Cipullo (195). Snell was 10-3 on the year and Cipullo was 11-15–showing impressive levels of varsity success for first-year high school wrestlers. Plus, a healthy Kyle Fries has been an asset at the 138-pound weight class during the second half of the season after missing the first half of the year.

The Lakers wrapped up their Patriot League Keenan Division schedule on Wednesday, Jan. 31 with a 51-27 win over Whitman-Hanson. As a result of the win where Baur, Walsh, Hamilton, Cipullo and Will Barkowsky (160) all had pins for the Lakers, the team finished second in their division standings with Duxbury at 3-2 in league matches.

Select Lakers wrestlers will compete in individual tournaments in the coming weeks.

Going up against tough Patriot League competition, the Silver Lake High boys’ basketball team continues playing competitive basketball.

At the start of the week, the Lakers were 4-8 after dropping both of their bouts last week. Even so, they continued playing tough and still have the opportunity to end the season on a strong note down the stretch against some solid competition.

The Lakers have shined on offense throughout the season. Specifically, Tyler Duggan and sophomore Nolan Hughes have been leaders in the team’s scoring effort. Only a sophomore, Hughes is only cracking into his potential now and there is plenty of reason for the Lakers to be optimistic about his rise for the team. After all, he stands tall at 6-foot-4, so that size is a major asset for the team, especially in the paint. 

There is definitely reason to believe the Lakers should play well down the stretch. They have been competitive in just about every game they have played in this season and if a couple of bounces went a couple different ways, they would be sitting at 7-5. This is because they had a tight 2-point loss to Scituate on January 23, lost to Duxbury 50-45 on January 19 and dropped a 55-50 bout to Sandwich on December 27.

Those are certainly teams the Lakers would have a great chance to beat if they have a rematch. In fact, they have a rematch on the road against Duxbury on February 15, so that one is bound to be a nail-biter.

Against Scituate last week, Hughes had three shot blocks while Matthew Bettle had one more. Tyler Duggan, Josh Gilbert and Danny Duggan all showed off their touch from outside range, sinking at least one 3-point shot each.

The Lakers next game is this Friday, Feb. 2 on the road against the Quincy Presidents  at 6:30 p.m.

The Silver Lake High girls’ basketball team is not only in the hunt for a playoff spot, but they could end up being one of the higher seeds in their respective bracket if they keep excelling like they have this season.

To start the week, the Lakers had a robust 8-3 record as one of the top teams on the South Shore. Offensively, they have continued to play well, regularly scoring more than 50 points per contest.

A major reason for that is they are an experienced team. Last season, they only had four players who had played varsity basketball prior to the season. This gave many players on the team extensive varsity experience–and they capitalized on the situation.

Now, the Lakers have six seniors listed on their roster: Alex Bachelder, Annabelle Boudreau, Sydney Kehoe, Emily Hapgood, Allie Crawford and Alyssa Nelson.

Crawford has been strong on both sides of the ball for the Lakers thus far and offensively, Kehoe, Nelson, Boudreau and sophomore Holly Reeder-Morning are a few of the many players who have shown prowess for the Lakers so far this season.

The Lakers have also played tough defense this season.

An example of this would be their 43-34 win over the Duxbury Dragons on Friday, Jan. 19.

So far, the Lakers have been just about as good at home (4-1) as they have been on the road (4-2). They have also done a nice job handling their tough Patriot League schedule (5-3 in league play) which features the likes of Duxbury, Whitman-Hanson, Quincy and Hingham, among others.

Some early momentum may be a part of the season why the Lakers have enjoyed this early success. Three of their first four games were non-league matchups and they won all of those three games.

The Lakers next game is this Friday, Jan. 26, at 6:30 p.m. when they will face the Whitman-Hanson Panthers on the road.

For most of the game, the Silver Lake high boys’ hockey team hung right in there.

Ultimately, however, their opponent surged late in the game and the Lakers (3-4-1) fell to the Whitman-Hanson Panthers (5-3-1) by a 3-1 score at Hobomock Ice Arena on Wednesday, January 10.

The Panthers had an early edge in the first period, spending most of their time on offense. They outshot the Lakers 6-4 in that span but were unable to score a goal as Alden Maguire played well in net. Defenseman Nick Iarossi had a great shot block with five seconds left in the period, preventing what could have been a goal.

In the second period, the Lakers would come out strong offensively. Defenseman Gregory Wolff netted the first goal of the game to put the Lakers up 1-0 less than two minutes into the period. He found the top right shelf and took his shot from around the blue line. Defenseman Liam Kelleher had the assist on the goal.

The Panthers were able to get some offensive momentum going as the game wore on. They tied the game up at one apiece with 6:17 left in the second period with a hard slapshot from inside the left faceoff circle. In the third period, they were able to put the game away.

The Lakers got outshot 10-3 in the third period and the Panthers took advantage of that. They scored goals with 5:49 remaining and 3:33 remaining to put the game away.

In the final couple minutes of the game, the Lakers were down a man because of penalties, so they faced long odds of making a comeback.

David Marani, Alexander Heffernan and Bobby Guilford comprised the Lakers first line of forwards in the game; John Evans and Nicholas Iarossi were their first defensive pairing.

The Lakers next game is this Saturday, Jan. 20 at Hobomock Ice Arena against Hanover (3:10 p.m. start time).

Since she was a star athlete in New England, it makes sense that Halifax native Chelsea Shaughnessy would be working in sports now that her playing days are over.

This is the case with Shaughnessy, a Halifax native who graduated from Silver Lake in 2008. This past fall, she wrapped up her third season as the women’s soccer coach at Mitchell College, a Division 3 program in New London, CT. 

The Mitchell College Mariners went 2-10-1 this past fall in what was more of a rebuilding season. The team only had three seniors on its roster, an indication that they are working their way back up. After all, Shaughnessy has already enjoyed some success in her tenure coaching the team.

In her first season as the Mariners head coach, Shaughnessy helped the team to a New England Collegiate Conference Championship appearance. A season later, her Mariners also made an appearance in the conference tournament.

After graduating college in 2012 with a degree in sports management, Shaughnessy gained coaching experience as an assistant at Johnson and Wales University for three seasons.

During her own athletics career, Shaughnessy was a standout. Not only did she excel as a multi-sport athlete at Silver Lake, playing soccer, basketball and softball, but she also achieved that ultra-rare feat at the next level during her tenure at Nichols College. The big difference in college, however, is that she picked up lacrosse as her spring sport.

During her Lakers career, Shaughnessy was recognized as an All-Scholastic athlete by the Brockton Enterprise and was named a Patriot League All-Star in multiple sports. In college, she was a three-time all-conference player in soccer. In lacrosse, she scored 55 goals in three seasons and in basketball she Nichols’ single-season record for steals (115) during the 2011-2012 season.

Since she was a standout athlete on multiple playing surfaces during her playing career, it should come as no surprise that she also serves as an assistant coach for Mitchell College’s women’s lacrosse team. Plus, she also coached basketball and lacrosse during her tenure at JWU. That said, Shaughnessy has used her success as an athlete to help others to also be the best player they are capable of being.

Two words that come to mind when describing the Silver Lake/Pembroke High gymnastics co-op are young and talented.

The co-op is coming off a 6-2 season in which they captured a Patriot League title and despite that success, the team also had plenty of talent coming back and more incoming talent, adding to what was already a successful program.

On Tuesday, Dec. 19, the co-op was not even at full strength but showed what it is capable of achieving. They competed in a quad meet against Whitman-Hanson, Marshfield and Hingham at the Massachusetts Gymnastics center in Pembroke. Scoring 123.3, the co-op finished second among the four teams and finished the day at 2-1 despite not fielding their entire lineup.

“I think we did really well overall for our second meet,” Silver Lake/Pembroke head coach Cristy Schimmel said. “It was much-improved from our first meet even though we had a few girls out.”

The co-op’s top performances came in the vault and floor exercises. Tori Newton (8.8 vault), Calliste Brookshire (8.6 vault), Ciara Dalrymple (8.1 vault), Sara d’Entremont (8.0 floor) and Maize Condon (8.1 floor) were among the team’s top performers.

One of the team’s top athletes, junior Morgan Hackett, was out with a thumb injury while one of the team’s talented underclassmen, Katie Kemp, got off to a late start to the season, so she was not eligible to compete just yet.

Another major asset the team has this season is a great deal of depth.

“We have some level eights, nines and tens which is great, Schimmel said. “A lot of them practice year-round here in Pembroke too which helps a lot.”

The co-op’s next meet is next Friday, Jan. 5, against Cohasset at the Mass Gymnastics C.

The Silver Lake High boys’ basketball team played a highly competitive bout against one of the top teams on the South Shore, but the first few minutes of the contest made all of the difference.

The Lakers fell to Whitman-Hanson on the road last Friday night, 70-58, after falling behind by double digits in the first five minutes of the game.

In the first quarter, the Lakers fell behind as the Panthers were sharp from field goal range. The Panthers scored 14 of the game’s first 15 points. The Lakers only score in that span was a free throw from junior Josh Gilbert. After that, however, the Lakers offense woke up and was highly competitive for the rest of the first half. Still, at the end of it, they trailed 39-22.

The Lakers got off to a strong start in the second half. Tyler Duggan sank a 3-pointer and Cam Danahy turned on a pair of free throws, putting the Lakers on a 5-0 run. After that, both sides were even in the third quarter, so the Lakers trailed 57-42 at the end of it.

Whitman-Hanson hit the first point of the fourth quarter and because they led by 17 with about seven and a half minutes left in the game, the Lakers did not have time to make a comeback.

Duggan scored a team-high 14 points for the Lakers while Josh Harvey finished second with ten points.

The Lakers showed that depth is one of their assets this season with nine different players scoring points in the contest.

With the loss, the Lakers fell to 0-2 on the season. Their next game is Wednesday, Dec. 27 against the Sandwich Blue Knights at home (7 p.m. start time). It will be the Lakers first non-Patriot League game of the season since Sandwich competes in the Atlantic Coast League.

What the Silver Lake High football team has been able to achieve over these past few seasons is certainly impressive.

This past season helped the Lakers stay on the right track as they made only their fourth playoff appearance since 1980. The part about that which stands out most, however, is that they have made it to the playoffs in back-to-back seasons now.

Plus, they won a playoff game in each of those seasons and most teams across the state cannot say the same.

The Lakers finished the year at 6-5 despite not getting the result they wanted on Thanksgiving, falling to Pembroke.

The Lakers had a strong senior class this year which will be hard to replace. They will lose both their offensive and defensive MVPs to graduation, running back Phil Lashley and middle linebacker Matt Powell. Each of them were Patriot League All-Stars twice.

On top of this, their offensive line is going to look a lot different. In addition to Powell, Gavin Hamilton, Frank Perfetuo, Reed Grenon and Nate Thacker were all seniors this year, so there will be much turnover there.

Under center, the Lakers will have their third quarterback in three years next year. This was Tanner Boyd’s first and final season under center.

The Lakers had three quarterbacks listed on their roster this year with the other two being Jake Waters, a junior, and Jesse Miller, a sophomore. Waters proved himself as a valuable asset defensively this year, recording multiple interceptions while Miller competed for the starting job with Boyd during the preseason, so the Lakers have at least two options there.

Regardless of who is under center for the Lakers, they will have Diamani Williams and Bobby Ohlson back to throw to, the team’s wide receivers from this past season.

Defensively, the team will also be without four-year letterman Liam Kelleher, who recorded over 50 tackles this past season.

The Lakers have about nine months off before their preseason starts next August.