By Michael Letendre
From time to time, we’re going to explore the local side of sports in a not so serious way in the pages of TBE.
COVID and this ridiculous pandemic has attempted to put a damper on every day life but we’re going to do our best to take you away from all this tomfoolery with a little scholastic insight and humor.
We have four items this week:
Item One: Noted Celtics fan, Bristol Central head coach Tim Barrette, is having conversations with former New York Knicks’ superstar Patrick Ewing…
The real truth: Thanks to just about every Division I college wanting a certain 7-foot-1 center from Central (that’s Mr. Donovan Clingan to you), Barrette is talking to a lot of coaches – including the head coach from Georgetown, Patrick Ewing.
But why is it okay for Barrette to chat it up with Ewing?
At the 1992 Summer Olympics, the United States sent its ‘Dream Team’ to Barcelona, Spain – as professional players from the NBA made up the men’s basketball team for the first time.
Ewing and Boston Celtics’ legend Larry Bird were both on the team and quickly became friends.
That’s why its okay for Barrette and Ewing to have conversations.
Now, if Barrette and Iona coach Rick Pitino were talking, I’d immediately hang up the phone (and change my number).
Item Two: In a weird scheduling quirk late last week, the CIAC website had the Bristol Eastern boys basketball team on the road to square off against a non-conference opponent in a ‘far away land’…
The real truth: The Lancers are listed to play Southington on Friday, February 19 and then – on the Eastern varsity boys page – it had Eastern traveling to Staples the following day for a 5 p.m. game.
Considering the pandemic and the fact that Eastern wasn’t going anywhere further than Avon this year, it was a weird quirk.
It was eventually fixed but when checking out Staples schedule before the change was made, the match-up between the schools was never posted.
Considering that the same website had the Bristol boys swimming team’s home meets scheduled on Eastern’s front field, it made you pause for a bit.
That little stream in front of the school couldn’t hold more than one lane, could it?
Item Three: Speaking of Eastern’s front field, what’s the deal with that ridiculous hat girls soccer coach Scott Redman wears during practices?
The real truth: With that hat, Redman looks likes he should be living in a Florida retirement community, driving around in a golf cart – trying to remember where he put his teeth.
In all seriousness, Redman has been involved in scholastic sports even before he officially attended high school at Eastern.
I remember Redman was probably in seventh grade, doing the JV scorebook for the boys basketball team at BE, just having a ball.
It’s in the blood.
Redman is high-character coach, big on positivity (unless he’s mad and yelling) and loves to teach his kids the games of soccer and softball.
But that hat!
You can see him wearing it from the other side of King Street.
Next time you see Redman out on the softball field and you’re driving by in your car, honk your horn at him (several times).
Item Four: Are we going to see any of our familiar friends at Bristol Central and Bristol Eastern at the boys and girls basketball games this year?
The real truth: I sure hope that we see Jason ‘Coachie’ DeCarolis at the Charles C. Marsh Gymnasium (Central) and Jim Tetro from the Thomas M. Monahan Gym (Eastern).
In terms of ‘Coachie’ and what he does at Central, he’s simply tremendous.
I need to hear him scream ‘first horn’ and then, while counting down the seconds, call out ‘second horn’ because no one does it better than him.
And when it comes to Tetro, he’s one of the unsung heroes at Eastern in terms of scholastic sports.
What he does behind the scenes, whether it’s keeping baseball stats, helping officials, running the scoreboard, and everything else in-between, Eastern is extremely lucky to have him.
Hopefully, those two will make at least a couple of appearances during the winter sports campaign.
