Fields ready, players prepare for the 2025 fall season

The fields were alive once again this week with the sounds of fall sports: the plop of a golf ball onto a freshly cut green, the twang of a goal post struck by a mis-aimed ball, the clatter of a field hockey scrimmage. And according to school and town officials, those fields were mowed, lined, and ready for play on day one, for the first time in anyone’s memory.

A total of 226 Bromfield middle and high school students—38% of this year’s estimated enrollment—signed up for one of the eight varsity sports offered by the district, according to Athletic Director Dave Boisvert. That number includes the 40 students who joined the Bromfield Acton-Boxborough rowing team, a club team hosted by the nonprofit Bare Hill Rowing Association, as well as the five students who will play football with the Ayer Shirley Panthers, the one co-op team supported by the district this fall.

Fall teams

This year’s Bromfield teams are:

• Boys and girls soccer (varsity, junior varsity, and middle school)
• Field hockey (varsity and middle school)
• Boys and girls cross-country (varsity and middle school)
• Boys golf (varsity only)

The most popular among these are boys and girls soccer. The boys team, coached once again by Alex Horne, drew 47 to tryouts for the varsity and junior varsity teams, and an additional 27 for the middle school team. Girls soccer will be coached again by Evan Woodworth. The team drew the second largest contingent: 27 for the varsity and JV teams, and 21 for the middle school squad. Later this week, coaches must choose their varsity lineups, typically consisting of 20 top players. “I don’t envy being a soccer coach this week,” Boisvert said in a recent office interview.

By contrast, enthusiasm for field hockey has declined. Bromfield lacks enough players for a JV team, and with six of its 17 returning varsity players graduating this year, field hockey could be in trouble next year, Boisvert told the Press. Nine players have registered for this year’s middle school team. Hudson, a member of the Midland-Wachusett League of which Harvard is a member, had just canceled its team for lack of players, said Boisvert. “It’s like, come on everyone, stay with it.”

Field hockey has the distinction of being Bromfield’s only coed team. For a third season, junior Anthony Cianfichi, who is among the team’s top scorers, will return for a third year on offense. Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association rules allow boys to play on girls teams and girls on boys teams if a sport for their gender is not offered by the school. Last year, Bromfield faced and beat North Brookfield 4-2 in a nonleague match, a team with three boys in the starting lineup.

Recruiting and signing up coaches is one of his biggest challenges, Boisvert said, but he starts the 2025 fall season with all but one of the available 13 coaching and assistant coaching positions filled by veterans of the 2024 season and longer. The one exception is Casey Vasel, a Bromfield grade 8 teacher, who is the new coach of the girls middle school soccer team.

The cost of registration for a varsity or JV team is $350; for a middle school team, $250, though the schools can provide relief for students in need. Fees are waived for any who qualifies for a free lunch. Students must provide a record of a physical exam done in the past 13 months and watch a short video on concussions. In the past, MIAA wanted sports players and staff to watch a video series on implicit bias, but that is now a recommendation rather than a requirement, a decision that predates the 2025 arrival of the current administration in Washington.

Fields of play

As for the fields, according to Boisvert and Park and Recreation Director Anne McWaters, they have never been better. Both said the seven used by the schools and youth sports programs were lined and ready for the start of the season this week. “That’s never happened before,” Boisvert told the Press.

McWaters attributes much of the improvement to DPW worker Deborah Cook, who has taken responsibility for the fields in the absence of the DPW’s longtime groundskeeper who is out on medical leave. Cook has been assisted by DPW employee Carl Lochiatto.

“Deb has done an amazing job,” McWaters said in a recent interview. One significant change has been Cook’s decision to mow and line the fields once a week. Historically, the groundskeeper would look at the school’s game schedule and if he knew a game was coming up on a certain day, he would get the field lined. By lining once a week, McWaters said, the lines may fade and get rained on or mowed over, but they remain visible enough for Cook to repaint them “rather than having to snap new lines.”

McWaters, who is responsible for scheduling and overseeing maintenance of the fields, said it had been necessary to replace the irrigation pump and pipes this summer at Harvard Park, a “pricey” bit of work. “The irrigation at Harvard Park was not working, so that had to be fixed … because it had started to burn. I was quite worried about it in mid-July but we got it fixed, so everything is good to go for the fall.”

In addition, McWaters noted, the front half of the heavily used Upper Depot Field was fenced off and given a rest last spring. “If you’re doing a pickup game or somebody’s just coming to practice, they just use that first section. And so that gets the most abuse. So we put snow fencing around it [and] it came back in. [DPW] seeded and fertilized and we kept people off of it. And I think that worked.”

Communication among herself, Boisvert, and DPW is working well, McWaters said. “The fact that I can communicate with all of them, and Deb can call me anytime that she has a question … or Dave can call and say, ‘Hey, can you get DPW to put some nets on a goal’ … it all seems to work. I think the fields are benefiting because of it.”