As four of Bromfield’s varsity teams prepare for state playoffs, the 12-member junior varsity field hockey squad is celebrating an undefeated 7-0-4 season. There will be no postseason tournaments for the girls, but they planned to celebrate their winning season with a banquet—the first since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic—at the Red Tail Golf Club on Wednesday, Nov. 2, where they were to be joined by Bromfield’s middle school and varsity players.
Miki Fitzgibbons, a Bromfield middle school teacher, has coached the team for four years. Although this year’s squad was the youngest she’s coached, it was “the most dynamically skilled,” she wrote to the Press. Three players were new to the sport, “a testament to the hard work and dedication of all players to work on fundamentals and help each other rise to each game,” Fitzgibbons said.
During the 11-game season, the girls scored a total of 33 goals and allowed only seven, thanks to the defense of goalie Cinzia Cianfichi, an eighth-grader. Two of the team’s ties were against Shrewsbury (1-1) and Trottier (3-3), both Division 1 schools.
The team’s top scorers were eighth-graders Anthony Cianfichi, with nine goals and three assists, followed by Hannah Huelin with nine goals and two assists. Third in points for the season was center midfielder Anna Selig, a ninth-grader, with seven goals and two assists. Selig joined the team midseason and started with both the JV and varsity teams.
Fitzgibbon told the Press that she tells her players it’s “anyone’s game on any given day. Even games where a team is out-skilled, sometimes it comes down to who wants it more,” she wrote. The team’s record, she said, “would indicate we wanted it more.”
With a roster of only 12 athletes in a sport that requires 11 players, “It’s hard to say how many and who will migrate up to varsity,” Fitzgibbons told the Press. “They all have grown this season and have laid the foundations to be successful if they continue to put in the work and maintain an openness to improve and be flexible. Any one of my players would be an asset on varsity.”
That’s good news for varsity coach Sue Silver and the varsity Trojans, who will say goodbye to 11 seniors at this week’s banquet.
Back row, from left: Charlotte Adamy, Tess Dirstine, Lucy Feltz, Anna Selig, Emerson Baker, Isabel Pierce, Clover Logan, Hannah Huelin, Lyla Kendrick, Ella Green, and Coach Miki Fitzgibbons. Front row: Anthony Cianfichi, Cinzia Cianfichi, and Gigi Benway. (Courtesy photo)
