Halfway through the season, Windham’s varsity unified team traveled to Gray New-Gloucester High School where they took on the Patriots on Monday, May 12. Windham showed a great deal of sportsmanship and both teams cheered for their opponents.
Windham senior Colby Schmid gives his bocce ball an elevated throw during a Unified bocce game at Gray New Gloucester High School on Monday, May 12. PHOTO BY MATT PASCARELLA |
“I think they did really well today,” said Windham varsity unified bocce head coach Kendall Dolan. “They were really excited, and they were taking pointers from the other team which is just really nice to see two different schools working together; a really great game.”
In bocce, one team throws a small white ball called the pallina, and the goal is to throw larger balls, called bocce, to get as close to the pallina as possible. Only the team closest to the pallina scores points. This match consisted of two 20-minute games with the winner being whoever has the most points when time is up.
Although the score is kept, the object of the unified bocce game is more geared toward having fun and being part of a team.
Everyone on the Windham team, including junior Mary Jean, junior Zachary O’Brion, freshman Tristan Stanley, senior Colby Schmid, junior Jack Shirley and senior TJ McAllister displayed good throws and there was a lot of laughing and high-fiving with both teams cheering each other on.
Schmid said one of the things that went well during the game was teamwork. He said both teams showed great sportsmanship. Schmid said if the team had maybe focused more it might have ended differently for Windham. The season has been going well.
In the first game, Gray New-Gloucester took an early lead and stayed ahead to win that game, 9-2.
In the second game, Windham stayed strong, but Gray New-Gloucester won 11-0.
O’Brion said things went well and he had fun. He wasn’t happy with the loss, but he said WHS will try and beat Gray New-Gloucester the next time they play them.
“We have a really good group this year,” said Windham varsity unified bocce assistant coach Connor McNeill. “Honestly, our team is super flexible, and they are really good about going with the plan whatever it is – one thing that’s hard about bocce is sometimes we don’t know how many players the other team is going to have – so they have to adjust to playing for a different school or playing with a different group that they may not be used to playing with. They are always willing to do whatever we need. In terms of improvement, the more we play the better we’ll go, and Gray New-Gloucester is just really good.” <
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