Plymouth South Boys' Hockey defeats Stoneham in OT Thriller for D2 Crown

Photo by Brendan Hall

By Michael Abelson (@ABELS0N)

BOSTON - The town of Plymouth had never seen a high school hockey team make a sectional final. Or win a sectional final. Or play at the TD Garden. Or raise a state champion’s trophy in the air.

All that changed yesterday.

The Plymouth South boys went shot for shot with Stoneham in a thriller that needed 2:26 of extra hockey, before junior Alex Hayward feathered home a shot while parallel to the goal line to earn South a 4-3 overtime win, and send its black-and-teal clad fans into a frenzy.

“The school started hockey in 1971,” Plymouth South coach Mike McCosh said. “No team’s ever done what we just did. The United States in 1980 had their miracle, but Plymouth, Massachusetts just had ours.”

Plymouth South Hockey tops Medfield to Make First Ever State Championship Game

By Jake Levin (@JakeLevin09)

Buzzards Bay, Mass. - When a trip to any championship is on the line, play makers tend to make plays.

So it should be of little surprise that Sean Colbert, captain of the third-seededed Plymouth South Panthers, scored with just 2:02 left in regulation to give his team some breathing room over the No. 8 Medfield Warriors.

The goal for the senior, who’s racked up well north of 150 points in his career, amounted to the game-winner, as the Panthers punched their ticket to the TD Garden for the first time in program history with a 6-3 win in the Division 2 South final on Sunday.

Massachusetts Super Bowl Previews: Divisions 1-3

Expect points galore when St. John's and QB Drew Smiley battle high-powered Mansfield.

By Joe Parello  @HerewegoJoe

A dozen high school teams from Eastern and Central Mass have finished their journeys down the #RoadToGillette, and are now preparing for the first state-wide football championships in Massachusetts history.

As you may or may not know, I've spent the majority of the year covering Central Mass. So, I will briefly touch on the exclusively Eastern Mass title games (Divisions 1 and 3), but give far more in-depth previews of the games that include teams from the heart of the Commonwealth.

So, here it is, Part I of everything you need to know about Super Bowl Saturday at Gillette Stadium this weekend.