h Boys’ varsity hockey wins the Lawrenceville Tournament, where they played—and won—four games in five days. Phil Schiller
for the entire season. But, Taft’s 3rd place finish came on the strength of all seven players: Balvani placed 2nd at #2, Maggie O’Neill ’14 5th at #3, Katherine Carroll ’12 4th at #4, Courtney Jones 6th at #5, Isabel Stack ’14 6th at #6, and Celina Schreiber ’12 4th at #7. Perhaps the best reward of the tournament came when Taft was chosen by the other teams and coaches as the recipient of the 2011–12 Sportsmanship Award.
Boys’ Hockey 10–13–1 This year’s team was a well-balanced group that played hard at both ends of the ice and was led by captains Mitchell Wagner ’12 and Al Nejmeh ’13. The Rhinos enjoyed arguably their best week of the season in December when they beat an undefeated Gunnery team (3–1), and then won the 64th Annual Lawrenceville School Ice Hockey Tournament by defeating Lawrenceville (4–2), Nichols (2–0) and an undefeated Belmont Hill School (1–0) in the championship game. Goaltender Marc Schiller ’13 led the way with stellar play between the pipes throughout that stretch. The other highlight of the season
was a 5–4 home victory over Choate Rosemary Hall on Parents’ Day. After losing captain Wagner to a concussion, the team never skated more than four seniors in the line-up, indicating the young strength of this team. Andrew Gaus ’14 led the team in scoring with 20 goals and 11 assists to earn an All-Founders League distinction with fellow linemate Rob Kiska ’13 (7g,17a).
Girls’ Hockey 6–15–1 This was a tough season for this solid team that skated competitively against many of the best teams in New England but struggled to score goals. Key wins came against league rivals Loomis (3–2), Deerfield (2–0) and Choate (4–3)—all three teams ranked in New England at the end of the season. Additionally, Taft lost five one-goal games. Tri-captain Katie McLaughlin ’13 and forward Katherine Roznik ’14 led the team in scoring, while tri-captain Taylor McGee ’12 and Lynndy Smith ’13 were solid defensively all season. For the second year, Colleen Marcik ’13 was fantastic in goal for Taft, often facing over 30 shots per game and finishing the year with a
save percentage above 90. The line of Alanna Fogarty ’12, Anne Tewksbury ’12 and tri-captain Jordan McCarthy ’12 provided a much-needed spark and proved influential in coming back from a two-goal deficit against Choate, capped off with McCarthy’s game winning goal with seven seconds left.
Skiing Taft finished 3rd out of the 11 teams in the Berkshire League, led by lowermid Eli Cooper’s first-place finish in both the Giant Slalom (88 racers) and Slalom. Cooper is the first Taft skier to win both individual titles in the same season. The strong skiing of Kramer Petersen ’13 (10th GS, 11th SL) and Andrew Trevenen ’13 (12th GS, 12th SL) ensured the 3rd-place team finish. On the girls’ side, Karlea Peterson ’14 led the way with 16th place in the GS and 24th in the SL, followed by Becky Frank ’15 in both. At the Class B New England Championships, Taft boys and girls finished 5th out of 13 teams behind Cooper’s 3rd-place slalom, Karlea’s 10thplace and middler Natalie Whiting’s 14th-place slalom out of 61 racers. Taft Bulletin SPRING 2012 17