Stowe boys coast to state title over rival PA

For fourth-year coach Shane Bufano, who took over for a school fresh off eight straight state championships, the goal was to keep the pressure on all night and prevent any breathing room. He said perhaps the hardest thing to do was to keep the team from celebrating too early.

“I felt like, for the last 20, our guys kind of got a little out of sync because they were starting to feel it, so I pulled a lot of the guys and tried to calm them down,” Bufano said after the game.

Stowe got things started early when freshman Graeme Jostrand scored just over 90 seconds into the game after a PA defender turned away a free kick and Jostrand returned it faster than an unhappy Amazon customer.

“We always plan on scoring really early, so when we got that free kick around midfield, the goal was to just get it in the box, and we got a lucky header from the defender and just got it in,” Jostrand said after the game.

That early goal set the tone and Stowe took that momentum and ran with it. Quite literally — both teams are fast, nimble and tough, but Stowe was just that much more of all three for all 80 minutes of Friday’s final.

After Jostrand’s goal, the teams settled into a groove in which the Raiders played offense by way of defense, completely clogging the middle and cutting off PA’s interior passing lanes every time the Raiders got something going.

After 30 minutes of entrenched back and forth, Stowe broke things open with 7:29 on the clock, when Leo Rovetto sent a cross inside to freshman Alistair Barrett, who booted it in.

Stowe completed the scoring with 1:01 left in the first half, after Hugo Jercinovic used the fancy footwork he had on display all night to free himself up for a one-on-one and slipped the ball past PA goalie Sam Stutz.

Hugo couldn’t be found for a post-game interview, but his twin brother Leo could. Leo said the team learned from its earlier loss to PA to not let up on the gas.

“Last time, they beat us in one good counterattack, and tonight, we just couldn’t let them build anything from the back,” he said.

The referees for the most part let the two rivals duke it out, keeping their whistles silent through all manner of tangled elbows and bumping shoulders.

PA had the advantage on corner kicks throughout the championship match, but winds of 20-30 mph forced both teams to keep the ball low, and looping chips with extra English were sent willy-nilly.

The second half on paper would indicate that PA found its footing, as the Wolves’ defense kept Stowe from scoring again, but on an artificial turf field that favored the speedy Stowe controlled the tempo throughout.

The Wolves did their best to make things happen from the wings, and managed a few good shots on goal, including a breakaway that forced goalie Brock Roick, clad in his Superman jersey, to earn his keep. He may have played a key role in Stowe’s 11th shutout of the season, but he said it helps to have a stalwart group of defenders in front of him.

“It was pretty tough tonight with the cold and the wind and everything, but I feel pretty safe even with them coming up the field because the guys are just so good,” Roick said.

Classic pairing

Stowe (17-1-1) entered the state championship game the top-ranked team, with PA the second seed. However, PA arguably had the edge going into things — even though Stowe ended its season with 11 shutouts, its one loss during the season was to the Wolves.

These two teams are well acquainted with the Division III title game, to put it mildly. Out of the last 17 state championships, there have been only three years when someone other than Stowe or PA was playing for the title.

The Raiders have the clear edge in the tally, winning 11 of those 17 titles, a feat that included eight in a row — the last one came in 2019 when the Raiders moved up to Division II for a few years.

The two squads are also well acquainted in the post-season, playing each other for the title six times this century. Indeed, the teams are a uniquely 21st century phenomenon, with the Raiders never winning a state title until they started collecting them like Pokémon cards in 2007.

Before that, Stowe’s only title game was a loss to Proctor, in 1968.

PA enjoyed only slightly greater pre-2000 success — it was the runner-up twice in the 1980s.

Even when the two teams are not meeting in the final game, their other games tend to take on extra meaning. Last year’s semifinal game felt to many like the championship, with the two teams duking it out until PA won on a header in overtime. They would go on to win the 2022 title a few days later, but everyone knew where the action was.

Despite the rivalry, however, arguably the most unique aspect of this annual autumnal matchup comes after the final whistle blows and the teams line up to give each handshake and many of them say, “I’ll see you soon at hockey practice” — enemies one moment, teammates the next.