-The Brattleboro Little League 12U All-Stars, the District 2 champs, opened the state tournament in Stowe July 25 with a 3-1 win over Camels Hump, the District 1 champs representing Bolton, Huntington, and Richmond.
Brattleboro then edged the host team, District 3 champion Lamoille County, 2-1, on July 26 to advance to the championship game.
On Saturday, Aug. 1, at 11 a.m., Brattleboro will face the winner of the July 29 elimination round game between Camels Hump and Lamoille County for the state title and a trip to the New England Regional tournament in Bristol, Connecticut.
• The Brattleboro 10U All-Stars defeated Bennington to win the District 2 championship in a best-of-three series. After a narrow 7-6 home win by Brattleboro in extra innings on July 14, Bennington tied the series with a 10-6 win at home on July 16. Brattleboro returned to South Main Street Field on July 19 and took the title with an emphatic 14-4 win in four innings to advance into the state tournament in Burlington.
Brattleboro opened the state tournament July 25 with a 15-0 win in three innings over Essex Town, and then shut out Colchester, 14-0. Undefeated Brattleboro will now play the winner of the July 29 Colchester/Essex Town elimination game in the championship game Saturday, Aug. 1.
Post 5 reaches state Legion tournament
Going into the final week of the American Legion Baseball regular season, Brattleboro Post 5 and Bellows Falls Post 37 were both fighting for a spot in the state tournament.
Brattleboro ultimately clinched the No. 3 spot in the Southern Division as they finished with a 9-9 record, despite losses in three of their last four games. Bellows Falls won two of their last four games, but just missed the fourth and final playoff spot as they finished at 8-10.
• After Ludlow Post 36 swept a July 18 doubleheader from Post 5, Post 37 kept their playoff hopes as they defeated Lakes Region, 9-1, on July 19.
Ludlow won both of their games with Post 5 with home runs in the final at-bat. Emmett Hutton had a walk-off grand slam to win the first game for Post 36, 11-7, while Eli Boxer had a two-run walk-off homer to win the second game, 9-8. Starting pitcher Devin Cheeney struck out nine batters to pick up the win for Bellows Falls.
• Bellows Falls and Brattleboro faced each other July 20 at Hadley Field and Post 37 came away with a 2-1 win. Jacob Kissell pitched a complete game for Post 37, giving up six hits, one earned run, and two walks while striking out five.
Quincy Knapp and Saul James scored the only two runs of the game for Bellows Falls. Post 5’s lone run came in the seventh inning when pinch runner Conner Emery scored on a single from Kayden McDaniels. The lack of scoring spoiled a solid effort by losing pitcher Sean Cozza, who allowed two runs on five hits, with one walk and three strikeouts.
• Post 5 wrapped up the regular season on July 22 with a 7-6 win over Rutland Post 31 at Tenney Field. McDaniels, pitching in relief for starter Ryder Butynski, got the win despite giving up two earned runs in 1 1/3 innings of work. That’s because Post 5 overcame a 6-3 deficit with four runs in the fifth to take a 7-6 lead into the sixth inning. Ryan Peloso then earned the save with two scoreless and hitless innings of relief to finish the game. Dermatis and Cozza each had a pair of hits, and Briar Cutting drove in two runs.
Bellows Falls faced White River Junction Post 84 on July 22 at Hadley Field. Post 37 fell behind early and trailed 7-2 entering the sixth inning, but almost pulled off a big comeback before losing, 8-6. Paul Young led Post 37 with three hits, while Jaden Bazin and Steven Joslyn added two hits apiece. Jackson Fletcher had six strikeouts and did not give up a hit over the final two innings to keep Post 37 in the game. Fletcher also had three stolen bases.
• Post 37 was still alive on July 23, the final day of the season, when they faced Rutland. If they could beat Post 31, and if Bennington Post 13 also lost to White River Junction, they would make in into the playoffs. But Bennington won, 15-9, and Rutland rolled to a 10-1 win to knock out Post 37.
• The double-elimination state tournament began July 25 in Fair Haven with White River Junction and Ludlow (each 13-5), as the No. 1 and No. 2 seeds, respectively, from the South. Brattleboro and Bennington were seeded No. 3 and No. 4, respectively, each with a record of 9-9.
Brattleboro, which clinched the third spot in the division by virtue of winning the season series against Bennington, defeated the Northern Division’s No. 2 seed, Addison County, 19-9, in six innings in the opening game of the tournament. No. 4 Bennington lost to Lakes Region, the host team for the tournament, in a play-in game.
Post 5’s game against Addison County was much closer than the final score indicates. Brattleboro raced out to a 7-0 lead, and did so with a pair of singles by Peloso and Kmar Hall and eight walks.
Addison County rallied and had a 9-8 lead over Brattleboro after four innings, but Post 5 took back control of the game. After McDaniels came into the game in relief of Cozza, he gave up three runs in the fourth, but McDaniels held Addison County scoreless in the fifth and sixth to earn the win.
The Post 5 offense did the rest. An RBI single by Peloso and a bases-loaded walk by Cozza gave Brattleboro the lead in the fifth. Post 5 then scored nine runs in the sixth to clinch the win. Hall and Spencer Claussen both had two-run base hits. Hall and Peloso each had three hits to lead Post 5, while Claussen had two hits,
On July 26, Brattleboro lost to Lyndon Post 30, 15-4, and will now have to fight their way out of the elimination bracket to stay alive in the tournament, which concludes on July 29. The Vermont winner will advance to the Northeast Regional tournament in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, and the Regional winner moves on to the American Legion World Series in Shelby, North Carolina, Aug. 14–19.
Shrine Maple Sugar Bowl kicks off Aug. 1
• The 73rd edition of the Shrine Maple Sugar Bowl is Saturday, Aug. 1, at 11:30 a.m., at Dave Wolk Stadium at Vermont State University-Castleton.
This game features the best recently-graduated high school football players from New Hampshire and Vermont facing each other to support Shriners Hospitals for Children in Springfield and Boston, Massachusetts, and in Montreal, Quebec. Two Bellows Falls players — running back Pat Connors and lineman Cam Perry — will be on the Vermont squad.
Last year, Vermont captured its third straight victory in the Shrine Bowl, beating New Hampshire, 19-14. However, New Hampshire leads the series with a 50-19-2 record. Advance tickets for Saturday’s game are still available at zeffy.com/en-US/ticketing/73rd-shrine-maple-sugar-bowl-game.
Academic honors for Croutworst
• Reese Croutworst, a member of the Brattleboro Union High School Class of 2026, was named to the United Soccer Coaches 2025–26 High School Scholar All-Americans based on her cumulative achievement in the classroom as well as on the soccer field.
Croutworst, a forward, ended her BUHS girls’ soccer career as the school’s all-time leading scorer with 80 goals. In the classroom, she graduated with a 4.0 grade point average. She was the only player from Vermont of the 63 girls’ soccer players selected from across the U.S.
She will be attending Springfield College this fall and will be continuing her soccer career while she pursues a degree in sport management.
Deerfield Valley cyclists participate in Pan-Mass Challenge
• Abigail Arnold of Halifax and Jon Chase of West Dover will be among more than 6,000 cyclists who will be riding Aug. 1 and 2 in the annual Pan-Massachusetts Challenge (PMC), a fundraiser for cancer research and patient care at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.
Since its inception in 1980, the PMC has raised $1.125 billion for Dana-Farber, making it the organization’s largest single contributor and accounting for 67 percent of the annual revenue of The Jimmy Fund, Dana-Farber’s community-driven fundraising arm. This year’s PMC fundraising goal is $79 million.
Each year, the PMC attracts riders and volunteers from 47 states and 12 countries and more than 300,000 individual donors. Thousands of cyclists and volunteers come together from across the world, hailing from 47 US states and 12 countries, with a shared purpose of raising as much money as possible for Dana-Farber.
Cyclists ride routes ranging from 25 miles between Wellesley and Bourne to 177 miles between Worcester and Provincetown. For more information, visit pmc.org.
Senior bowling roundup
• Week 12 of the spring/summer season of the Brattleboro Senior Bowling League on July 8 at Brattleboro Bowl, saw Queen ‘n’ Jokers (40-20) and Pin Heads (39-21) still at the top of the standings, followed by The House (34-26), Skippers (33-27), Slo Movers, Strike Force, and Ducks (all 27-33), Near Miss (26-24), Team Two (25-35), and Number 1 (22-38).
Mary Pulaski had the women’s high handicap game (253), while Shirley Aiken had the high handicap series (646). Eric had the men’s high handicap game (256), while Mike Pavlovich had the high handicap series (680). Team Two had the high handicap game (816) and Queen ‘n’ Jokers had the high handicap series (2,547).
Kevin Napaver again had the men’s high scratch series (629) with games of 222, 213, and 194, while Pavlovich had a 578 series with games of 215 and 191. Robert Rigby had a 563 series with a 201 game, Warren Corriveau Sr. had a 550 series with games of 203 and 198, John Walker had a 527 series with a 212 game, Skip Shine had a 510 series, and Brown had a 192 game.
Aiken had the women’s high scratch series (457) and game (186). Carol Gloski rolled a 160.
Randolph T. Holhut, deputy editor of this newspaper, has written this column since 2010 and has covered sports in Windham County since the 1980s. Readers can send him sports information at [email protected].
This Sports column by Randolph T. Holhut was written for The Commons.