It seems like this will be the last news I break on the High School Sticking blog: After seven years at The Journal News, today was my last day.

In that time, I’ve been the beat writer for 10 high school sports (hockey, Rockland football, Rockland boys basketball, boys lacrosse, girls lacrosse, indoor track, outdoor track, [...]

Next year’s schedule is coming into focus. Suffern-Mamaroneck and Rye-Pelham will play each other twice, while Rye still plays Mamaroneck, Suffern will play White Plains and Mahopac will play Suffern, Mamaroneck and Pelham.

First, just to clarify, here are the league schedules:

Conference 1 (Brewster, Carmel, Kennedy/PV, Lakeland/Panas, Mahopac, Ossining, Pawling, Yorktown) will play a double round-robin. 

Conference [...]

It took a few more months, but after losing in the final minutes of the Division I state championship in hockey, Mamaroneck’s Luke and Christian Glaser, Sean Hagan and coach Mike Chiapparelli got that second state title in baseball (I think that’s one of the Glasers hugging Hagan on the right).

We also had Mike Miller [...]

Sorry I couldn’t get to this until now but I was at a lacrosse tripleheader yesterday. The conferences have met to determine scheduling for next season.

Each conference held a seperate meeting to vote on the procedures they wanted, which is why some are playing each other twice, some are playing each other once, and some [...]

Division II just got a little deeper. Sleepy Hollow/Irvington has declined in enrollment (not sure which school is at fault) and are now in Division II. Goalie Dylan Lacey and top defenseman Craig Halpin are gone, but barring transfers, pretty much everyone else will return to the Legends, who went 16-4-2 and tied White Plains last [...]

The hockey ADs met at BOCES today and made it official — hockey will be using the new conferences, without any changes. Here they are again:

Conference I (8 teams): Yorktown, Lakeland/Panas, Carmel, Mahopac, Kennedy/Putnam Valley, Pawling/Dover, Brewster, Ossining

Conference II (7 teams): White Plains, Scarsdale, Mamaroneck, New Rochelle, Sleepy Hollow/Irvington, Pelham, E/T/B

Conference III (8 teams): Greeley, Fox Lane, John [...]

The suspense has been building for long enough. Congratulations to Matt Willows, the Rockland athlete of the season, and Marc Flory, theWestchester/Putnam hockey player of the year. And here’s the “all-star” team for Westchester/Putnam and the “all-county” team for Rockland. 

There were only six programs in Rockland, so I held a coaches meeting and we selected the [...]

New Rochelle native Kevin Shattenkirk will be representing the Hudson Valley Thursday in the NCAA Division I Frozen Four. The Boston U. defenseman will face Vermont at 8:30 p.m. in Washington D.C., and the winner will play either Bemidji State or Miami (Ohio) in Saturday’s championship.

Colleague Josh Thomson has the details in Monday’s paper. I believe [...]

Pelham’s Marc Flory earned another honor last night, this time from the Westchester Ice Hockey Officials Association. The first-team all-state forward won the Horton R. Shaw Memorial Scholarship, which goes to a college-bound senior who is also a referee and displays scholarship, athleticism and leadership in school and on the ice.

Flory is the fifth recipient to receive [...]

Another story I wasn’t able to get to during the season was the ongoing saga of the 2009 Empire State Games. It was originally scheduled for July in the mid-Hudson Valley (Poughkeepsie and Newburgh), and then cancelled after state pulled all $3 million in funding and threatened to charge participants $285 each.

There is still no [...]

A lot of people know about Rob Fine’s theatrics in the postseason (five straight games with a goal, including the winner against White Plains in the sectional final and in double-OT against Massena in the state quarters). That’s what likely earned the Mamaroneck senior forward his all-section honors. But perhaps more remarkable was his play in [...]

I purposely stayed away from travel hockey during the high school season, but now that it’s over it’s time to congratulate some local players.

Alex Hagen and Brian McNamara of ETB, Ryan McGee of White Plains and Brad Pesce of Sleepy Hollow/Irvington will be playing in the Midget Tier 1 Hockey National Championships with the Long Island Gulls [...]

Hi everyone, thanks for hanging in there while I was on furlough. I’m just starting to go through four days of e-mail but here’s the rest of the postseason awards from the coaches. There a few awards remaining — Section 1 awards that will be given out at the all-section dinner Wednesday, and the Journal [...]

Here is your League 1 all-star team:

Sean Hagan, Sr., Mamaroneck
Luke Glaser, Sr., Mamaroneck
Rob Fine, Sr., Mamaroneck
Brett Jackson, Sr., Mamaroneck
Zac Hiller, Sr., Suffern
Paul Gabriel, Sr., Suffern
Greg McCarron, Sr., Suffern
Kevin Norwin, Jr., Suffern
Steve McCarrick, Sr., White Plains
Ryan McGee, Jr., White Plains
Matt Benincasa, Sr., Rye
Marc Flory, Sr., Pelham
Victor Dzenis, Jr., Pelham
Mike Mamone, Sr., Pelham
Chris Mastrocola, Jr., Mahopac
Adam Urban, [...]

The all-section team was selected this afternoon in a coaches meeting at BOCES. After originally thinking it would be 14 spots, Section 1 reconfigured the formula (which involves number of leagues and number of starters) and allowed 17 players to be named. The coaches voted to put the 14 all-state players on automatically, and then [...]

The final hockey edition of Varsity Central Live will be Wednesday at 7:30. You can watch it and ask questions by clicking here. Please join me and special guests Sean Hagan of Mamaroneck and Mike Mamone of Pelham as we look back on a historic final weekend in Utica, where two Section 1 teams made [...]

Here’s a look back at the top story lines from the past three months. Please use the comments section for anything I left out. 

1. Back 2 Back

 Brett Jackson (left) scored twice as Mamaroneck defeated White Plains 4-1 to win its second straight sectional title. After losing two of its first three league games, the Tigers [...]

”’Tis better to have loved and lost/ Than never to have loved at all.”

That saying (by Alfred Lord Tennyson) pretty much sums up the weekend in Utica for me — both teams are probably still hurting from coming so close to winning state championships (especially Mamaroneck, which held a 2-0 lead), but in the coming days they’ll [...]

Mamaroneck’s Sean Hagan became the first Section 1 player to win Player of the Year in either division since the award was created in 1996, and Marc Flory became the first player to earn first-team all-state honors in Pelham history. Matt Willows, Luke Glaser, Brett Jackson and Victor Dzenis were also selected from Section 1. [...]

Pelham-New Hartford

End of first period: New Hartford leads 3-0. Shots are 19-9 NH. Gavin Lambdin did all he could to keep the game scoreless after 10 minutes, but the Spartans erupted for three goals in the final 4:16, including two goals 14 seconds apart. Pelham has been behind in every playoff game so far, but it [...]