The Walrus

ARROWS SPORTS
Vol LXIII, No. 3
St. Sebastian’s School December 2009
Ryan Kilcullen ‘10 looks for the open man on the court against Holderness last year.
We Playin’ Bas-ket-BALL
We Love That Bas-ket-BALL
M. FECHTELKOTTER ‘12
& DAN AISENBERG ‘11
As the football pads, soccer cleats,
and running shoes are put away. The
Air Jordan’s, the LeBron Air Max’s, or
any other type of basketball sneaker
began to be more abundant in the
lockers in the athletic building. For,
the winter sports season has begun.
The Arrows varsity Basketball
team is looking foreword to
another successful season in the sixth
season under Head Coach Morelli.
About half of the team is made up of
returning players, including senior
co-captains Ryan Killcullen and
Ryan Hayes. However there is also a
great deal of new players who could
contribute greatly to the varsity basketball
team. For example, Quandel
Johnson came in against Kingswood-
Oxford when senior foreword Chris
Dillon got tired.
Other key members of last
years team who are returning are
Derric McCottrell, who is expected
to slam home more alley-oops than
last year; forewords Charlie Allen and
Kevin Lynch; and shooting guard Jake
O’Malley. With the exception of Derric
McCottrell, all returning players from
last year’s team are seniors this year.
In addition to the returning seniors,
there are also two seniors who
joined the team this year. Therefore,
the Arrows Varsity Basketball team
has a total of 8 seniors.
Two other key additions to
the Arrows Varsity Basketball team
this year are assistant coach Sedale
Threatt Jr., and Patrick Durgan. Sedale
Threat, graduate of St. Sebastian’s
School in 2003, who went to
play football at Lehigh, but also during
his time at St. Sebastian’s, he was
a member of the Varsity Basketball
team. The other new coach, Patrick
Durgan, has a lot of basketball
experience. He was previously the
Assistant Coach at Bentley University,
which has been very successful
in recent years, making it to the elite
eight of the NCAA Division II in both
2007 and 2008. Both coaches will
defanatly bring a great deal with him
in helping coach the Arrows.
All of these people are part
of the Varsity Basketball team because
they will help the team reach
their goals for the season; which,
according to Coach Morelli, are that
they want to compete in, and of
course win, league games. They are
also striving to get better as the season
goes on. This will be especially
important for the 5 underclassmen
on the team, for next year. They will
need to step up next year, for the
team will lose 8 players to college.
In the Arrows first game
against Kingswood-Oxford, a very
talented team, which contained
multiple players who could leave
the backboard shaking after making
a windmill slam dunk, they met a
few of these goals. Despite a slow
start, in which they gave up a few
deep threes, had a few consecutive
turnovers, and the shot blocking
abilities of one of the Kingswood-
Oxford starters who prevented the
Arrows from making many close
shots, the Arrows were able to give
Kingswood-Oxford a good game.
The Arrows will look to
continue to improve and compete in
their ISL and home opener against
St. Georges on Wednesday December
9, at 5:15. They also are looking
foreword to playing in the River’s
tournament, which begins on December
17 through the 19. The team
also hopes to win their own tournament,
the St. Sebastian’s tournament,
which is January 2 and 3. The
Arrows are also looking foreword to
big games against winning ISL rivals
like St. Marks, who they play at home
on February 10, at 4:30, and Belmont
Hill, who they also play at home on
January 9, at 7pm. Regardless of
whether the Arrows are home or
away, I strongly encourage students
to go to the games.
Hockey Looks To Stay
Competitive in Tough ISL
played hard and tough, but it is hard has they take on Brooks and look for
BY CHRIS WARNER ‘11 to win games early in the season their first home win of the 2009-
when about half of the previous 2010 season. After Brooks, the Arrows
will host their annual Christmas
The fall season is over and it is officially
the time for the winter sports to be-
team graduated. However, the
Arrows are not going to dewell on Tournament from December 18-20
gin. However, this year, St. Sebastian’s
the lost suffered last Saturday and and then play Catholic Memorial in
has some new faces around the rink.
are focusing on their next opponent the Mutch Cup at Harvard University
Head Coach, Mr. McCann, is new to
BB&N who the Arrows will faceoff on December 23, 2009 at 7:00 p.m.
St. Sebastian’s this year. Mr. McCann
against on Saturday, December 12,
Although the Arrows are off
was previously the assistant hockey
2009, at BB&N. I am sure the Arrows a slow 0-1-1 start, they are looking to
coach over at Harvard University and
will do better there.
get a win against BB&N and Brooks
is excited to coach at St. Sebastian’s.
In addition to such a new and go into the winter break with
St. Sebastian’s also has a lot of new
team, another obstacle to Arrows the record a solid record of 2-1-1. I
players on the team. With only five
must face is the fact that their first believe that the Arrows will become
seniors returning, a lot of young
three games are on the road. The Arrows
first home game is Wednesday, they work out all the kinks that come
a lot better as the year gets old and
players were able to make the team.
The team is quite young, but that is a
December 16, 2009 at 4:30 p.m. The along with a new and young team.
good thing. Returning seniors, Ryan
Arrows will be taking on The Brooks The Arrows will definitely be one of
Coffey, Mike Ewing, Peter Burke, Robbie
Dunahoe, and Tommy O’Regan
School. I strongly urge all students the stronger teams in the ISL as the
to come out and support the team year progresses.
will take on the leadership positions
on the team and help the new players
adjust and become better hockey
players.
The Arrows’ first game
ended in a 2-2 tie against The Rivers
School in Weston, Massachusetts.
Although dominating most of the
game, the Arrows still found themselves
down going into the third
period. However, two third period
goals, one by Ryan Coffey and the
other by Tommy O’Regan tied up the
game and prevented a loss for the
visiting Arrows. Also, Donny McGuirl
had a solid game between the pipe
stopping 16 of 18 shots. Despite the
tie, the Arrows were in control most
of the game and had a lot of shots
against the Rivers’ goalie, but were
not able to slip any by until the third
period. Although the Arrows were
did not get the win, which they would
have wanted, they team should be
proud of how they battled back and
got the tie.
The Arrows’ most recent
game was December 5, 2009 against
the Milton Academy Mustangs.
Unfortunately for the Arrows, they
suffered a brutal 7-1 loss. The team Don McGuirl ‘11 guards the net against incoming pucks
Wrestling Looks To
Build on Last Year’s
Surprising Success
BY JOHN DONOVAN ‘12
The wrestling team is off to a fantastic
start this year. Shortly after
fall sports concluded the wrestling
team was training and preparing for
the upcoming match at St. Paul’s.
The team this year is extremely
young and appears to have a
promising future. Composed largely
of middle schoolers, the wrestling
team is a force to be reckoned with
especially at lower levels.
The first three weeks of the season
of the season composed of
intense physical conditioning
which stressed all the members of
the team. However, after pulling
through Sarge’s (Coach Ryan) boot
camp, which consists of jogging
dozens of laps around the field,
bounding up and down stairs, exercising
with Coach Suavulin, etc., the
wrestling team was ready for their
first match. The team clambered on
the rickety bus and travelled over
to BB&N, where they would meet
Varsity Results
Varsity Hockey:
Rivers T 2-2
Milton L 7-1
Varsity Basketball:
Kingswood-Oxford L 73-54
St. George’s W 57-51
Varsity Wrestling:
St. Paul’s L 56-22
their opponents, St. Paul’s School. St.
Paul’s has an equally strong wrestling
program as St. Sebastian’s, they
didn’t appear to be as tough. The
Arrows seemed to dominate their
opponents in almost every match
wrestled. In fact, the Arrows would
have defeated St. Paul’s if it weren’t
for the fact that we forfeited more
than four weigh classes. The rest
of the season appears to be very
promising, and the Arrows will most
likely win many of their upcoming
matches.
At the moment the team,
despite the teams’ massive middle
school population, is greatly lacking
in upper school varsity participation.
At the moment there are about
11-12 members Freshmen Year and
above. I encourage anybody to join
the team. Although everyone says
“the conditioning is impossible” and
“It’s such an awkward sport,” both are
false statements. First, the conditioning
is not impossible because clearly
all of us on the team endure it everyday.
Second, all the sport does involve
close-contact; the satisfaction
of defeating one’s opponent overcomes
any shyness. Andrew Sullivan,
Class of 2013 and two year wrestling
vet, says when asked about the
sensation of winning, “It feels great
when you finally win a match and all
of your hard work in practice pays
off.” Mr. McCarthy constantly iterates
throughout practice to motivate that
everything done on the mat, all the
blood, sweat, and toil, is completely
worth it when the referee raises your
hand above your head marking you
as the victor. It is well known that all
the students at St. Sebastian’s school
are highly competitive and have a
hunger for victory. Wrestling is the
ultimate task in which one can prove
oneself physically able.
I say once again as I do at
the end of every article, support all
the teams, there are so many especially
in the winter. Skiing, Squash,
Hockey, Swimming, Basketball, Wrestling,
Dodgeball, and of course the
Chess team (pride of St. Sebastian’s
Athletics). GO ARROWS!
Squash Team Looks
New and Improved
BY CHRIS STADTLER ‘12
What is Squash? I asked myself that
question about 3 weeks ago, when
Mr. Moore challenged the entire
school to join his group of dedicated
players. All I knew about squash was
that it was the sport that John Cheever
had dominated. Despite my lack of
knowledge, I decided squash would
be my sport this winter by default.
Mr. Moore, who played club
Squash in college, explained to us the
commandments of Squash, later at
practice. He elucidated that squash is
a game played in a cube with slanted
edges on two opposing sides, and
two other strait edged sides with one
being seven feet tall and the other
about 25 feet tall. A player must hit
the largest wall above a red line three
feet off the ground. Then the next
player must do the same without
letting the ball bounce twice. A
match includes 3 games each
played to eleven and the first player
to win 2 of these three games is
the victor. In essence, that is the
rules of squash, but some other
rules due apply. Those rules include
interference, serving protocols and
boundaries.
More than half the team
at the meeting had never played
squash before. Andrew Bono
proposed tryouts. This notion was
quickly shot down, as it was agreed
first everybody should learn the
rules and have some experience
before vying for the chance to be
apart of the Squash 09’ experience.
The next week I entered
Squash with an opened mind ready
for my first practice with Mr. Moore
as coach, who is self proclaimed
to be the “best squash coach this
school has ever seen.” When this information
is relayed to Mr. Webb, the
previous coach, by pigeon to Peru,
the possibility looms of him making
the long awaited return to battle for
supremacy in the octagon against
Mr. Moore.
A few fellow teammates
and I arrived at Nobles at around
6:50 for the 7:00 practice. With my
Prince racket in hand I invited John
Cheever, the number one seed, for
a friendly volley, only to realize that
there was no such thing as an amicable
volley in squash. I rammed into
the boards twice and three times
whiffed so bad one might think I was
trying to fan myself.
Hereafter, the situation
began to change; after a quick jog,
Mr. Moore took everyone new aside
and explained the rules to us. With
our new knowledge, we could finally
play the game without having to
concoct rules to fill in the wholes of
this alien game.
The next three practices of
the year soared by, as all included
improved in a wide arrange of ways.
Style happened to be one upgrade,
as practices progressed. Chris
Nadeau most recently sported mid
calfs - which have become an integral
part of one’s squash attire - , one
arm sleeve and a white bandanna
to cap it all off. Rail shots, which is a
shot down the boards, were a main
focus and in a short time. Many
succeeded in obtaining a quality
rail shot that often can put away
opponents or put him in a difficult
situation.
Overall squash has been a
rewarding experience. Never have
I left a practice thus far thinking, “I
really wish I didn’t waste that time”
or “that just wasn’t fun.” Each practice
brings another battle, a great laugh
with teammates or the inevitable
improvement in your game.
For all students still without
something to do this winter and
sick of wasting all that time getting
dominated by some random guy
living on Modern Warfare two (your
still 15 hours of wasted time away
from him anyway). Join Squash and
give something new a try. Modern
Warfare three or four will be better
time spent anyway