Champs

As the school year’s final buzzer is approaching, it’s time to look back at the Oyster River High School (ORHS) sports teams whose final buzzer meant victory. Volleyball, girls cross country, boys ice hockey, and girls’ indoor track all had the honor of representing their school’s name in the best way possible, 2023-24 State Champions. 

*At the time of writing this, the spring season has not finished so I apologize if there is a team I miss because of this.* 

Girls Cross Country 

Expectations were sky high this year as it’s been nothing but success in the past for the ORHS girls’ cross-country team. “We won states my freshman year, and then we were second sophomore year,” said star runner Mackenzie Cook (‘25). “We definitely wanted to come back and win it.”   

The season kicked off about as good as they could have hoped, winning the Bobcat Invitational with a combined score of 27, almost 90 points less than Bedford who finished second (lowest score wins).   

The smooth sailing continued the further the season went. They won the Manchester Invitational with a score of 47, the Black Bear Invitational with a score of 55, and then completed the “pre-state meets” undefeated by winning Battle of the Border in Alvrine with a score of 52.   

While this season may seem too good to be true, it in fact was just about perfect. “There were no major setbacks,” said Cook. “Being undefeated in New Hampshire is a pretty big thing, and it’s pretty impressive.”   

Going into the state meet, individual preparation was important, but the team seemed to prioritize preparing as a team. They understood that the state meet brings more nerves than any other meet and to counter them, the seven varsity runners decided to take them on together. They became more of a team who all focused on the same common goal.  

The state meet went just as smoothly as every other meet. The team put up their second lowest score all year with an eye opening 29. “It was a really fun race,” said Cook. “It was a very hot day and there was a lot of stress around that, so the result was such a relief.” ORHS had 5 runners finish top 10. Cook finished second with time of 19:06, Haley Kavanagh (‘25) finished fourth with a time of 19:30, Haley Bezanson (‘27) finished sixth with a time of 19:43, Neely Roy (‘26) finished seventh with a time of 19:46, and Madelyn Cook finished tenth with a time of 20:45. The other two runners also had a phenomenal race, both placing top 30 out of the 110 runners. 

Boys Ice Hockey 

Before the season even started, there were high expectations for the Bobcats, said returning Capitan Cam Miner (‘24). “I knew we were going to have a great team this year. We all knew that we would have a solid shot at it this year.”   

The season kicked off great for the ORHS boys’ hockey team, beating last year’s champion Dover in the opening before falling to Winnacunnet at home. After this, they went six straight without defeat before losing two straight. “It definitely knocked some sense into us,” said star forward Camden Beaupre (‘24).   

After this road bump, the team made some major changes. “[The losses] were tough. The other captains and I approached the coaches and told them what the team was thinking, and I think that really seemed to work,” said Miner. After these changes, the team never lost again for the rest of the regular season.   

Going into the playoffs full of momentum, the Bobcats were ranked second, and were set to play Goffstown in the quarterfinals. After beating them 4-2, they were set to play in their fourth semifinal in four years. But for the first time in those four years, they won, beating Alvirne-Milford in an exciting 4-0 rout and were set to play Spaulding in the championship.   

Going into the state championship, the team found themselves in uncharted waters with none of the players ever being there before. “We wanted to treat it exactly like any other game.” said Miner. “It was obviously a little hard because none of us had experienced this.”   

This mindset clearly worked as less than a minute after the puck drop, Beaupre found Braiden Moriarty (‘26) who made it 1-0. “It was great to get the lead early. It shifts the tone of any game,” said Beaupre. After this, with stellar goaltending from Cole Harwood (‘25), and goals from Miner and Sawyer Levesque (‘25), for the first time in ORHS history, they were state champions.   

“The key thing for our team was that everyone bought into the system instead of playing as individuals,” said Beaupre. 

Girls Indoor Track and Field  

 This team was yet another team who started the season with high expectations. Similarly to the girls’ volleyball team, the girls indoor track and field team were looking to repeat as state champions, as last year, beating out Newmarket by a slim 2.5 points to win the state meet.  

The season opened with a small meet at Phillips Exeter Academy, where they tied for first place. But that was never really the goal. “It was just about getting the rust off, and also performing as best as we can individually to start the year,” said Erin Carty (‘24).   

After starting the year off hot, the team cooled down a bit, finishing in sixth place in the next meet, followed by two fourth-place finishes. The final three meets before weren’t scored but even though they never won as a team there were some signs of promise. This included Carty consistently finishing top two in 55-meter hurdles, Makenzie Cook and Kavanagh dominating in a variety of individual runs, and the relay team doing well no matter who was running.  

To prepare for the state meet, the team focused mainly on finetuning their fundamentals. “It was a lot of skill days where we were focusing on our individual events,” said Carty. “We didn’t do anything big to make sure no one was sore or tired.”   

The state meet couldn’t have gone any better for the ORHS girls indoor track team as they put up a score of 100, over 60 points more than second place Kearsarge and almost double the score they put up at the previous year’s state meet (highest score wins). Individually, Carty won the 55-meter hurdle and finished second in the 300-meter, Kavanagh won the 1500-meter, and Cook won the 3000-meter and finished second in the 1500. The 4 x 200 relay team came in second, and the 4 x 400 and 4 x 800 relay teams finished first. Other impressive finishes were Madelyn Cook and Bezanson finishing third and fifth respectively in the 1500-meter, Roy finishing fourth in the 3000-meter, Avery Baumgardt (‘26) finishing third in long jump, and Talia Banafato finishing fifth in the 1000-meter. 

Girls Volleyball  

 With the 2022-23 girls’ volleyball team winning the state championship, they entered the 2023-24 season looking like the team to beat. But the team understood that going back-to back would be no easy task. “[winning the championship last year] didn’t really have any impact on us,” said Captain Emilia Cavicchi (‘24). “We lost some important players who graduated so we had to start fresh.”   

The season started with a bang when they defeated Winnisquam 3-1, which they followed up by thrashing rival Saint Thomas 3-0. “It really hyped us up because Saint Thomas is one of our rivals and one of the better teams we were set to play,” said Cavicchi.   

Defeating teams became clockwork for the team as they rode out the regular season going undefeated. All this time they managed to only lose four sets out of the 52 that they played throughout the season. But they stayed disciplined, even having the mentality that four sets dropped was still too many and that they shouldn’t be dropping sets at all.   

They were obviously the team to beat as playoffs came around. The ORHS girls’ volleyball team was the top seed and received a first-round bye into the Quarterfinal. They ended up playing Saint Thomas, and just like they did earlier in the year, they shutout Saint Thomas and readily continued on to the semifinals. In the semis, they met Campbell who carried an impressive 11-3 record going into the playoffs. But just like the Saint Thomas game, the Bobcats shut Campbell down, swiftly winning 3-0.   

The finals were set, Oyster River vs Coe Brown. Not just a rivalry, but also a rematch of last year’s finals. “Coe Brown was our biggest competitor this year by far. So, it was definitely a lot of nerves,” said Cavicchi. The two teams met once in the regular season, and it ended in a 3-0 Bobcats win.   

This time around, it wasn’t as easy. The Bobcats found themselves in the fifth set for the first time all year. “We tried to persevere because we had never been [in the fifth set] as a team,” said Cavicchi. The Bobcats battled through and emerged as back-to-back state champions. 

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There are multiple strong spring sports teams that hope to make a run for a state championship, but because I’m writing this mid-season, all I can do is wish them good luck! 

– Kevin Kell