By Edd Merritt, Contributor

Alpine champions. Photo By Chris Boffa

Mid March saw the CVU High School Alpine skiers capture two state championships. Two days of giant slalom races (the first at Cochrans, the second at Smugglers Notch) proved to be the tipping points for both men’s and women’s teams. For the men it was the first ever Alpine championship. For the women, it was the first in nearly 20 years.

Redhawk males topped runners-up St. Johnsbury Academy, Mount Mansfield Union and defending champion South Burlington in that order. Cochran’s course gave CVU women an opening day lead, while the men produced only one racer among the top ten (Seth Boffa in nineth).

Redhawk individuals in the two-run combined slalom races were Sean Gilliam, second, Peter Gilliam, fifth, and Ari Diamond, seventh, on the men’s ledger; Dicey Manning finished fourth in slalom and fifth in giant slalom among women. Olivia Zubarik was runner-up in slalom.

Redhawk basketball ends its season at the hands of Rice
Rice Memorial High School proved that they deserved the number one seed going into the state finals. They traveled there through a semi-final 72-38 win over CVU. The Hawks led early on in the game, but Rice soon caught up, switching its defense to a tough 2/3 zone, making the score 40-19 in favor of the Green

Knights at halftime.
Deng Dau, Devin Rodgers and Oliver Pudvar led the Redhawk offense while coach Mike Osborne was able to break with his tradition of bringing all team members into on-court action. Instead he rewarded the five seniors for their dedication by letting them play an early stretch of the game as teammates. Those Redhawk seniors were Zach Doane, Henry Bijar, Deng Dau, Ethan Czarny and Devin Rodgers.

Coaches select hockey all-stars
The following selections to state all-star rosters for men’s and women’s hockey teams is based on nominations from individual coaches.

Women’s hockey
CVU/MMU players: Karina Bushweller–defense, Riley Erdman–forward, and Tess Everett–forward.
CVU academic all-stars (need a cumulative 3.5 GPA): Alicia and Katherine Veronneau.

Division I men’s hockey
First team: Redhawk goalie Jack Averill
Third team: CVU forward Cam Saia

Contributors include Chris and Nan Boffa and Tom Giroux.