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WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 781-593-7700 JUNE 23, 2022
A father’s pride for two of Peabody’s best
SOFTBALL
By Matthew Roy
AMHERST – Mark
Bettencourt and Steve
Lomasney are two of the most
famous names to ever take the
field for Peabody High. But
on Friday afternoon at Sortino
Field on the campus of Umass-
Amherst, they were in a completely
different role: fathers
cheering on their daughters in
the Division 1 softball final.
Unfortunately for the
Tanners, the outcome wasn’t
what they had been working
for all season as the defending
champion Taunton broke open
a tight game with a four-run
sixth inning and then held off a
Peabody comeback in the seventh
to take a 5-3 victory.
For Bettencourt, who saw
daughters Abby and Isabel on
the mound and catching respectively,
there was a lot of
pride in seeing a group that
he coached all through Little
League finding their way to the
big stage.
“I’ve coached most of these
girls since they were six or
seven and they are like part of
the family,” Bettencourt said.
“They’ve been through so
much already in terms of winning
and they all feel like my
daughters in a way.”
For Lomasney, whose
daughter Logan played second
base on Friday, the duties of a
dad kept going right until game
time as he dropped off a case
of drinks into the dugout just
before the first pitch.
For Lomasney, who was a
catcher in the Red Sox organization,
the ride to the final had
been quite fun.
“It’s great,” he said. “It’s
been enough for me. I had my
good times but these are for
them. They will remember all
of this for a long time.”
It was Lomasney’s stellar
defensive effort in the semifinal,
diving toward the middle
to spear a ground ball and
throwing it to first for the out
with the bases loaded, that
saved the Tanners’ 3-2 win in
that game.
Playing on a big stage was
nothing new for most of this
talented team as they had won
championships at every level
beginning in Little League
right on through reaching the
North final last year and the
state title game on Friday. For
Peabody’s Isabel Bettencourt makes contact.
Bettencourt, who is also the
coach of the Peabody baseball
and football teams, it’s a different
feeling being on the outside
looking in.
“Honestly, it was harder
being a coach. You’re worried
about the team,” he said. “With
my kids as a part of the team,
you’re focused on your kids.
But all of these girls have had
so much success already and
honestly, they are all like my
kids.”
Lomasney had another way
of looking back at the loss
in last year’s North final as a
catalyst to the success that the
Tanners had in 2022.
“Losing the way they did
last year was very hard,” he
said. “Having seen them grow
up in Little League and have
the success they did, they had
never really faced the feeling
of losing.”
Even though they came up
short on Friday, the future isn’t
dimming for Peabody anytime
soon as they return seven
starters next season and have
an incoming class of freshmen
that Bettencourt knows well.
“The eighth graders that
are coming in next season all
played on those teams that won
over the last few years and they
are going to be very good,”
Bettencourt said.
PHOTOS| JAKOB MENENDEZ
Peabody’s Abby Bettencourt slides safely into second.
District 16 Little League tournament opens Friday
YOUTH BASEBALL
By Steve Krause
The annual District 16 Little
League All-Star tournament --
also known as the Williamsport
Tournament -- will begin Friday
night at Peabody West’s Cy
Tenney Park with Pine Hill
playing against East Lynn.
There are some changes this
year, and they involve the Lynn
Little League system. Once
seven strong, Lynn’s Little
Leagues are down to four: East
Lynn, West Lynn, Wyoma and
Pine Hill.
Over the years, charters for
both Lynn Central, which was
located in the city’s Highlands;
and West Lynn National had
their charters revoked. The Nats
played at Barry Park, which is
now the home of the West Lynn
league.
East Lynn, which plays on
Alice O’Neil Field behind Lynn
English, merged with Lynn
Shore prior to the start of the
season. Pine Hill and Wyoma
remain the same, “but once the
two leagues merged, I changed
the boundaries a little bit to
create more balance,” said district
administrator Joe Baglieri.
Other changes over the last
two years are that Saugus is
officially one league. Initially,
said Baglieri, the two leagues
remained in place, but with one
board of directors.
“But Little League, without
giving too much warning, took
all the leagues working with one
board and merged them.”
Saugus’ main field is behind
the Veteran’s School --
Grabowski Field.
The teams competing to dethrone
Peabody Western in
District 16 are: West Lynn, East
Lynn, Pine Hill, Wyoma, Saugus,
Swampscott, Revere, Winthrop,
Lynnfield, Peabody and Peabody
Western and Salem.
Peabody Western won the state
championship last year, but lost
in the New England tournament.
The last team from the district to
make the Little League World
Series was Western, in 2019.
Saugus American -- one of the
two merged Saugus teams --
made it in 2003.