by Ken Brown
CRAFTSBURY – For the first time in the modern era, Craftsbury Academy (CA) will not field either a girls or a boys’ varsity soccer team this fall.
With only 28 boys enrolled at CA and lower than expected numbers on the girls’ side, Charger fall sports looks like a shell of itself in 2023. Cross country head coach Mike LeVangie and his three-time defending state champion boys’ team is the only game in town this fall, but as of last week, he was still looking for a fifth runner to complete his team to defend their title. CA will not field a girls’ cross-country team this season. It is the first time in recent history that CA won’t field a boys’ varsity soccer team and the second time for the girls’ varsity program. The Lady Chargers were unable to field a team in 2018 and returned to varsity competition in 2019. Dylan Washer, Grayson McNaughten, and Kosmos Gletos are competing for Hazen Union boys’ soccer team this fall. Washer will be a starting midfielder for the Wildcats in his senior campaign and McNaughten will be Hazen’s starting goalkeeper in just his sophomore season. Sadie Skorstad will slip right into a starting role for the Hazen Union girls’ soccer team after leading CA in scoring and earning an All-Mountain League First Team selection a year ago. She’ll be joined at Hazen by fellow Lady Chargers’: Savannah Boyce, Sophia Augsberger, Adelina Augsberger, Natalie Hill, and Cedar Greiner. John Stein was hired as the new athletic director late this past summer to replace Connor Bean after one season. Stein is the third A.D. at Craftsbury Academy in four years.
Conover Exits during Tumultuous Time
MARSHFIELD – David Conover has stepped away from his athletic director duties after one year at Twinfield-Cabot.
With the recent announcement of the cooperative agreement to merge Twinfield, Cabot, and Danville athletic programs by the Caledonia Central Supervisory Union (CCSU) in the near future, Danville’s Randy Rathburn will take over all athletic director responsibilities for all three schools for the time being. Conover abruptly resigned his post with just weeks before the start of the fall season, technically making Rathburn the seventh athletic director at Twinfield-Cabot in less than a decade. Danville-Twinfield-Cabot will begin their new cooperative agreement this fall in girls’ varsity soccer. All fall and spring sports going forward at both the varsity and middle school levels at all three schools will be under the CCSU athletic cooperative. Basketball at the varsity level will remain separate, but will be revisited if either school struggles with participation numbers. The disastrous floods this past summer destroyed all competitive fields in both the Marshfield and Cabot communities, leaving the Twinfield-Cabot boys’ team without a home field. Rathburn is left to not just nurture the merging personalities of all three schools at the athletic level, but to also find home dates at either Danville or possibly U-32 for the Trojans.
