The Wayland boys’ ice hockey team faced two schools this last week. After a 3-2 win over Bedford and a 2-2 tie with Dracut, their overall record is 11-5-3, and the team’s in-league record is 8-1-1. I’m sure captains Marcus Daisy, Roby Williams and Peter Orlandella are proud to lead such a hard-working and successful team this season.

Also competing this week was the Wayland boys’ basketball team against Lincoln-Sudbury and Concord-Carlisle. After falling 54-44 to Lincoln-Sudbury on that team’s senior night, the team was fired up to add another win to the 10-6 record as it stood in the middle of the week. However, the team came up short against Concord-Carlisle, losing 41-38 in a tight game. It was hard to sit through the close game, but the Wayland fan section that grew quickly during the game helped motivate the players and kept me excited up to the very end.

Warrior captains Evan Brisson and Robert Williams Jr. have led the team through a challenging season.

“[The biggest challenge was] having only three returning players and having to find how we play together best with all of the new guys,” Brisson said.

He and the rest of the players are proud of their six-game winning streak earlier in the season, and he said that the team is “looking to find that momentum again heading into the playoffs.” I’m sure they will as the fans come out to support them!

Also competing this week was the Wayland wrestling team, crushing the sectional meet hosted at the high school this weekend. Wayland put up four first place winners (Ryan Bache, Cole Elias, Michael Connell and Bailey Vespa), one second place winner (Ben Jones), four third place winners (Chris Oyola, Tommy Cope, Charlie Tillett and Zach Dieffenbach), one fourth place winner (Jared Thompson), as well as two fifth place winners (Josh Brito and Javier Lopez). Overall, that makes 12 members of the team earning spots on the podium. In addition, Head Coach Sean Chase won the Sectional Coach of the Year award. Congratulations on these incredible wins!

Yet another successful team this week is the girls’ swim team, which won the state meet! Besides impressive first place finishes by the 200-yard freestyle medley (a relay team) and junior Molly Pierce in the breaststroke, the team has many strong swimmers who finished in fourth, fifth, and other places in the top 16 spots to earn points for the team. Congratulations to the entire team on a great season of hard work that has obviously paid off!

Realistically, it’s been a week of tough competition, and there’s another such week coming up. Since everyone is on break, I would definitely suggest you try to catch at least one of these games if you’re around; they definitely won’t be disappointing. Tuesday, the hockey team faces off against Weston and then will be coming up in an away game against Concord-Carlisle on Wednesday and a home game against Auburn on Friday. Friday and Saturday, the wrestlers who placed this past weekend will continue competing in the state meet. Good luck to all the teams this week!

Congratulations to all the Wayland teams on their hard work and many successes this winter season, and as Coach Smith used to say, GO WARRIOR NATION!!!