Last fall, Frontier Regional School became the first boys’ soccer team from Franklin County to win a western Mass. title and the Red Hawks are not looking to give back the crown.
One year after an improbable western Mass. Division III title, the Red Hawks will look to make it two in a row when they head to Westfield State University Sunday at noon to face third-seeded Belchertown High School in the championship game.
It’s a rematch of last year’s semifinal showdown, which took place at Szot Park and ended with the underdog Red Hawks triumphant on a Connor Hamilton first-half goal that lifted Frontier to a 1-0 victory.
Frontier is a much different looking team this season after graduating 13 players from last year’s WMass championship squad. That made this season’s success a bit of a surprise. The Red Hawks won the Schmid Division during the regular season and finished 10-3-4 overall to earn the fourth seed.
“Naturally, there was some uncertainty as to whether we could get back here and defend our title after losing 13 seniors,” Frontier coach Dale Totman said. “Our captains have been incredible this year, though, both in their play and in their leadership to the younger players. The younger players have really stepped up and are performing at a really high level. It’s been awesome to witness and be a part of.”
Frontier’s postseason run has been full of excitement, as it needed overtime to defeat Pope Francis High School in the quarterfinals, and then went to penalty kicks to beat top-seeded Hampshire Regional High School in the semifinals on Thursday. The penalty kick session went to 10 rounds before Frontier finally won, 8-7, in kicks.
Belchertown went 10-7-1 in the regular season and finished third in the Churchill division to earn the third seed in the tournament. The Orioles opened tourney play with a 9-0 beatdown of Drury High School, before defeating second-seeded Southwick-Tolland Regional High School, 3-0, in the semifinals.
Alex Morgado leads the Orioles in scoring with 17 goals and nine assists and he has scored in six of his past eight games, including two goals against Drury, and a goal and an assist against Southwick. Ben LaClair has nine goals on the year, Hayden Bennis finished with five goals and eight assists, Jarod Bolton has six goals, and Evan Fournier has a team-high 10 helpers. Tanner Clark starts in net with Noah Pare, Cyrus Raines and Connor LaFlamme as the top defenders in front of him.
Frontier, meanwhile, has been led offensively by Ethan LaFleur, who has 14 goals and six assists this season. Zach Hamilton has seven goals and six assists, Ian Newman has seven goals and two assists, and Dan Bronke has six goals and two assists.
Frontier goalie Peter Bronke has played well all season and that includes a pair of strong postseason efforts. Bronke managed to stop a penalty kick in the second half of the Pope Francis game to give the Hawks a chance to win it in overtime, and he then came up big in penalty kicks.
“We’re feeling really good about how we’re playing right now and even though Belchertown is a great team and will present a big challenge, we’re going to play our game and we’re confident we’ll get it done.”