Bishop Stang falls to Hingham in girls hockey championship, 5-2

BOSTON — The young Bishop Stang girls hockey team may have faced defeat on the ice of TD Garden Sunday, March 16, but they aren’t through making history.

Ranked as 15 in Division 1, Stang’s team fought their way through the tournament, winning the program’s first-ever state game before conquering the rest of the bracket that led to Sunday’s matchup in the finals. 

Stang faced first-seed Hingham High School on the Boston ice. Despite making the first and last goals of the game, Stang was defeated, 5-2.

The last record to be broken by the team remains unfinished, but they don’t intend to keep it that way for very long. 

Isa Rioux, a sophomore forward, said, “I think even though it didn’t end up the way we wanted, it just shows that by the time our grade gets to our senior year, we should be so good.”

She added, “There’s 13 of us sophomores and I think once we have another year together it’s going to be great.”

Stang’s hockey team is a co-op that consists of 10 area schools, including Dartmouth, New Bedford, Durfee, Greater New Bedford, Somerset Berkley, Fairhaven, Seekonk, Apponequet and Dighton-Rehoboth. 

Rioux, who attends Dartmouth High School, scored the first goal of the game in the first period.

She said it was great to experience, especially with the crowd, which has only grown since Stang’s successful start to the tournament season.

“We never really get that many fans back at home,” she said. “Seeing those people there to support us was really awesome.”

The second goal of the game was scored by Ashley Smith, a freshman forward from Apponequet High School.

Freshman goalie Vivienne Melo, who attends Dartmouth High, made over 20 saves. Though Melo has been playing hockey since she was 4 years old, it was only about five years ago that she began in the goalie position.

The big crowd made her nervous, but Melo said when Hingham made a shot in, she realized it was time to step up and started regaining her confidence.

For Melo, the girls on the Stang team are what makes hockey so special. “They all just push you up and they always tell you to keep your head up no matter what.”

She added, “It just feels good to know that you have people on your side.”

As a senior, forward Kacey Curran, who attends Durfee, will not have another opportunity at the championship, but for her, what the team has managed to accomplish this season is a worthy enough legacy. 

“I’m just so proud of every single girl on the team,” Curran said. “I just love the community we have on this team. We’re all like a big family.”

With Hingham being the number one team in the division all season long, Head Coach Bill Theodore said he knew Stang would need to bring their best game, which was unfortunately not the case on Sunday, noting the girls had “run out of gas.”

Theodore said, “I’m obviously disappointed in the results, but so happy to have been here and experienced this.”

And with this experience, Theodore looks to build on it as the team continues to grow both in numbers and skill.

“They got a taste of it and now they want to come back, so I think that will be motivation for them,” he said. 

“The coaches and I are so proud of this team and the girls,” he added. The work they put in, how they stuck together, how they never gave up all year long — so proud of them.”