COUNTY COURIER QUESTION OF THE WEEK: 02/03/2022
**Each week, the County Courier sports staff will answer one “Question of the Week” in regards to the high school sports scene. Check back each Thursday to see what question we are answering and don’t forget to pick up a copy of the County Courier on Thursdays**
What storylines are you are looking forward to see play out throughout the rest of the winter regular season?
BEN KAUFMANN
I had a few in mind – Can the Enosburg girls snap a skid of great regular seasons without a trip to the championship game? Can the MVU girl’s hockey team turn a run of one-goal losses into wins and make a playoff run with its first-year coach and young roster? But I think the one I have to go with centers on the BFA-St. Albans Bobwhite hockey team. Someone (Essex) finally landed a punch on the Bobwhites, can they answer the bell and send legendary coach Toby Ducolon off into retirement with his 10th coaching championship? BFA (10-2) faces its second serious test with a visit from undefeated Rice (10-0) on Wednesday night. At the time of this writing, that game hasn’t been played, but by the time you’re reading this you’ll know how Ducolon’s boys handled the challenge. Win or lose against Rice (for the record, Essex lost twice by scores of 1-0 and 3-1), the Bobwhites are all about the postseason. There have been plenty of years in which the eventual champion had regular-season losses to the eventual runner-up or others. Without a doubt, BFA hockey doesn’t hang banners for regular season accolades. They’ve lost as a favorite and won as an underdog, the only thing that matters in St. Albans hockey is whether you can win the last game of the year. BFA has the firepower, it’s got the coaching staff, it’s got everything in place to bring home a 21st program championship and 10th under Ducolon (who also won two as a player). To be sure, BFA could lose in the first round and it would do nothing to diminish his status as one of the great Vermont coaches of all time. But wouldn’t it be fun to send him out with one final banner?
ANTHONY LABOR
I’m going to go with a couple here. I am looking forward to seeing how the MVU girls basketball team finishes out the regular season and how they fare in the playoffs. As of Thursday, the Thunderbirds are 8-5 with two losses against North Country, one against Enosburg (who suffered just their first loss on Thursday), Middlebury (by two points) and Div. I BFA-St. Albans. They got some revenge against Middlebury on Wednesday when they came away with a 41-39 win. The program has had its struggles in years past, but they are coming together and coming away with victories. Even in the game against Enosburg, which the Hornets won 37-23, the Thunderbirds actually played pretty well in that game and moved the ball well, but just struggled getting their shots to fall. If some of their shots, especially early on dropped, that game could have looked a bit different. The Thunderbirds have some tough matchups to close out the regular season against Mt. Abraham and Lyndon, but it’ll be exciting to see this team grab a couple more wins and see what they can do in the playoffs.
The second storyline I am keeping an eye out is what will the BFA-St. Albans girls hockey team’s record be at the end of the regular season. After their 7-4 win over South Burlington on Wednesday, the Comets are 12-0 and have had a number of lopsided victories. But they have also had a few games which they were tested in one or two-goal victories, so this team knows how to battle adversity throughout the course of a game, including trailing 2-0 at the end of the first period on Wednesday against South Burlington. This next week will be a tough test for the Comets, who will travel to Rutland on Saturday, host Essex on Wednesday and travel to Spaulding on Feb. 12. The Comets have played all three teams already this season. They came away with a 7-1 win earlier this year against Rutland in a game that was 1-1 going into the final three minutes of the second period before the Comets dominated the final 18 minutes of the game. They then blew past Essex 12-4, but still it’s BFA vs. Essex which means you never know what you are going to get. And finally, they will travel to Spaulding in a game that saw the Comets come away with a hard-battled 5-3 victory. They also have a game against CVU/MMU left on the schedule after BFA came away with a 3-1 victory early this season. The Comets have the ability to sweep the rest of the schedule with their ability to play four lines, a solid defense and two quality goaltenders, so it’ll be exciting to see what they do the rest of the way and going into the postseason.
JOHN BONNETTE
As the regular season winds down and we head into the playoffs the storyline I want to see playout is can Toby Ducolon end his coaching career with the elusive 3-peat in Div. I hockey. Coach Ducolon and the Bobwhites have not 3-peated sense 1979 when they won the last of their seven straight state championships of the decade.
BFA has gone back-to-back 3 times sense (1982-83, 1987-88, 2016-2017) but have not been able to find a way to three straight. Essex knocked them off in championship game 1984 and again in 1989 after injuries forced the Bobwhites to start their third-string goaltender in the finals. Then South Burlington upset the top-seeded Bobwhites in the quarterfinals back in 2018.
Back in 2020 the BFA knocked off Stowe the day before the world shut down for Covid in what the last sporting event of any kind that year. They won their second in a row in front of no fans over Essex last year. But the question is can coach Ducolon punctuate his brilliant coaching career by winning three straight this March?
