BY MATT SCHOOLEY Paul Cohen knows he needs Herculean efforts from the 24 players on his Bow High School football team if the Falcons hope to earn another Division V playoff appearance. “If I had a big squad, a lot of kids would play one way. We don’t have that, so we have to prepare for each week faced with the reality that ...

BY MATT SCHOOLEY Tom Babaian isn’t looking for his team to replicate what it accomplished last season, but he does hope it ends with his football team holding a championship plaque for a second consecutive year. Babaian’s Pelham Pythons completed their undefeated 2007 campaign with a state title, and the team returns some ...

BY RYAN O’CONNORDivision III football has a different look in 2008. While perennial beast Souhegan of Amherst remains the favorite, and always-solid Milford and Portsmouth are still around as well, Plymouth, winner of seven of the last 10 D-III titles, moves down a division. “From year to year, the teams change so much it’s ...

BY RYAN O’CONNORSitting at a youth hockey conference, watching what was likely to be another boring prerecorded training video, Kermit Brunelle sighed. On the screen, Don Lucia, coach of the national champion University of Minnesota ice hockey team, was giving a speech. “A lot of people think I have the best job in hockey, and I tell ...

BY RYAN O’CONNORIt’s uncomfortable, but it’s a conversation both parties know must take place. As practice begins, Bill Walton, the John Stark wrestling coach, pulls Morgan Belanger aside. “You know if anything inappropriate happens, you have to tell me,” he says. Belanger nods. She’s had this talk before. ...

I figured it out. That is, the reason why I never cared for football. You see, I'm a baseball fan.  In baseball, the best teams compete in a series of games to determine a winner.  Now, I understand that you can't play seven football games in a row or you'd be ripped apart from limb to limb.  But, I also ...

BY RYAN O’CONNORGoffstown-area athletic successes in 2007 came at many levels, for teams and individuals. This was never more evident than the summer, when nearly every Goffstown youth baseball team, from Little League through Babe Ruth, finished tops in their district, among the best in the state and, in some cases, the region. Those ...

BY RYAN O’CONNORIt was a year of near-misses and so-closes on the 2007 Bedford sports landscape, though there were a few spot-ons mixed in. While dozens of local teams and individuals competed for the top prize in their respective class and/or division, from the youth level through high school and sometimes beyond, many went home empty ...

BY RYAN O’CONNORFor Hooksett-area teams and individual athletes, 2007 was a year in which the surprising became the norm, particularly at the high school level. Though squads such as the Central girls tennis team finished tops in Class L and Cawley Middle School collected multiple titles, other perennial contenders bowed out of the ...

I'm not much of a football fan, but the Patriots have me tuning in at odd hours of the night just to see the point spread.  I'm wondering if they might possibly hold on to their "undefeated" moniker for the entire season.  And that possibility really makes me want to tune in to all the antics on the field ...