-The Southern Vermont League (SVL) Nordic championships, a four-meet event, began on Jan. 23 with a 5-kilometer freestyle race at the Marlboro Nordic Ski Club.
Brattleboro, the host team for the Jan. 23 race, did not fare well collectively, but had some strong individual performances. In the girls’ race, junior Maayan Coleman finished third in 16 minutes, 45 seconds, while fellow junior Xela Nestel was ninth in 18:43. They are Brattleboro’s only two girls’ varsity skiers. Woodstock’s Kasia Sluska was the girls’ winner.
Sophomore Liam Conathan-Leach had the Bears’ only top 10 finisher in the boys’ race with a 10th place time of 16:47. Other finishers for the Brattleboro boys included freshman Dylan Bouchard (13th, 17:26), freshman Milo MacArthur (15th, 18:09), sophomore Walker Korb (16th, 18:17), and sophomore Charlie Kiehle (23rd, 21:29).
Arlington’s Tobias Counts won the boys’ freestyle race in 13:43, and continued his winning ways in the 5K skate race at Mountain Top Nordic Center in Chittenden on Jan. 27. Counts was first in that event in 16:27, just two seconds ahead of Mount Anthony’s Eli McEnaney, who also finished second to Counts in the Marlboro race. Conathan-Leach was third in 17:32.
Woodstock finished 1-2 in the girls’ race, with Priscilla Richardson winning in 19:19, nosing out Sluska by just one second. Coleman again finished third in 20:49.
The SVL championships continue on Feb. 4 with a 5K classic race, and conclude with a mixed relay race on Feb. 11.
Boys’ basketball
• Twin Valley kept rolling along with a 77-57 win at Arlington on Jan. 23 and a 98-35 home victory over Long Trail School on Jan. 28 to up their season record to 10-2.
• Brattleboro entered February with a 3-8 record after a 76-47 loss to Burr & Burton in Manchester on Jan. 28.
• Bellows Falls is 3-6 after road losses to Fair Haven (57-49 on Jan. 23) and White River Valley (74-65 on Jan. 29).
• Leland & Gray ended January with a 2-10 record after a 91-21 loss at Fair Haven on Jan. 23 and a 64-32 home loss against Mount St. Joseph on Jan. 29.
Girls’ basketball
• Bellows Falls (11-3) had its eight-game win streak snapped on Jan. 24 with a 51-37 loss at Hartford. The Terriers bounced back with a pair of home wins — 43-33 over Rivendell on Jan. 27 and 47-28 over White River Valley on Jan. 30.
• Brattleboro (5-8) lost to Windsor, 36-30, on Jan. 24 and beat White River Valley, 55-32, on Jan. 27.
• Twin Valley (6-6) lost to Mount St. Joseph, 55-45, on Jan. 24, beat Long Trail, 46-44, on Jan. 28, and lost to Poultney, 42-27, on Jan. 30.
• Leland & Gray (2-10) ended the month with a pair of losses to Sharon Academy (44-23 on Jan. 27) and Woodstock (55-34 on Jan. 30).
Ice hockey
• The Brattleboro boys (1-10-1) keep losing heartbreakers. The latest was a 5-4 defeat against St. Johnsbury at Withington Rink on Jan. 28. The Hilltoppers got the game-winner on a power play in the final two minutes of the game to hand the Bears their eighth straight loss.
• The Brattleboro girls were beaten by Harwood, 10-0, on Jan. 28, to fall to 0-8 on the season.
Malouin to play in Quebec hockey tourney
• Owen Malouin, 13, of Guilford was recently selected as one of the two goaltenders for the Adirondack Jr. Wings to compete at the 66th annual Quebec International Pee-Wee Hockey Tournament, in Quebec City, Canada, Feb. 11–22. The “Q” is the most prestigious minor hockey tournament in the world and features more than 100 birth-year 2013 teams from all over the globe. The Adirondack Jr. Wings first tournament game is against the Waterloo Wolves on Thursday, Feb. 12 at the Videotron Centre in Quebec City.
Malouin, who was the starting catcher on the 2025 Brattleboro Little League 12-U All-Stars, is currently the lone goaltender for the E9 Springfield Junior Thunderbirds AAA Elite 2013 team, based at Olympia Ice Arena in West Springfield, Massachusetts. He is a former goalie for the Brattleboro Hockey Association Hawks, who brought home the Withington Cup and a GSL Championship in 2022 in a stunning 5-0 shutout final. He was also selected in 2024 for Hockey USA’s Futures Camp and attended as one of two goalies from Vermont.
Owen’s 2025-26 hockey season with the Junior Thunderbirds has been strong with a league record of 17-4-3, with five overall season shutouts, and a save average over .900. A former Hilltop Montessori and Guilford Central School student, he now attends The Bement School in Deerfield, Massachusetts, as an honor roll seventh grader.
Malouin said in a news release he is looking forward to many things while in Canada, besides eating poutine and billeting with a French-Canadian family. “I’m mostly excited to play in front of thousands of hockey fans at the Videotron.” The most challenging? “Trying to stay on top of my homework!”
Stratton Mountain School well-represented at Winter Olympics
• More than a dozen athletes with Vermont ties are on the U.S. Olympic team, representing the state in Alpine, biathlon, cross-country and freestyle events at the 2026 Winter Games in Milan and Cortina, Italy that begin Feb. 6.
Stratton Mountain School (SMS) in Winhall, and its T2 elite Nordic training team, is home base for many of these athletes, including Jessie Diggins, a 34-year-old SMS T2 team member.She is seeking to add to her medal count — she won U.S. Nordic’s first-ever gold in 2018 and a silver and bronze in 2022 — before wrapping up her racing career this March. Diggins is expected to compete in all six Olympic women’s cross-country events, which will require her to ski as little as 7.5 kilometers in one race and as many as 50 in another.
Diggins will be joined by Julia Kern, a 2022 Olympian and a two-time World Championship medalist who is also a member of the SMS T2 team. The 28-year-old Kern debuted on the World Cup tour at 19 and finished 18th in the 2022 Winter Games in the womens’ individual sprint. She’s won two medals in the world championships, a silver in 2025, and a bronze in 2023 with Diggins as a sprint partner.
Not far from Winhall is Landgrove, population 177. That town will have an Olympian in Italy: Ben Ogden, a 25-year-old University of Vermont graduate who has also trained with the SMS T2 team. In his second trip to the Winter Games, the two-time NCAA national champion is expected to focus on sprint races in mens’ Nordic skiing.
There is one other SMS alum who’ll be competing in Italy this year, snowboarder Mac Forehand, 24, of Winhall. He’ll be in the slopestyle and big air events. He finished 11th in big air in the 2022 Winter Games and won a silver medal in slopestyle at last year’s world championships.
Snow golf returns to Scott Farm Feb. 22
• On Sunday, Feb. 22, from 12 to 3 p.m., The Landmark Trust USA (LTUSA) invites the public to its fourtth Annual Snow Golf: Chip, Drive, & Putt for Preservation at Scott Farm, 707 Kipling Rd., Dummerston. Tickets for this fundraising event are $35 per person or $130 for a team of four, and advance registration is suggested.
LTUSA is a nonprofit historic preservation organization that has restored Naulakha, the 1892 Dummerston home of author Rudyard Kipling, and five other Southern Vermont properties including the newly opened Naulakha Stable, which it owns and operates as overnight vacation rentals. According to the U.S. Golf Association, Kipling invented Snow Golf at Naulakha following his introduction to the game by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle of Sherlock Holmes fame.
This year’s course will once again be designed in partnership with the Brattleboro Country Club and features six skills challenges — including Chipping Skeeball, Tic-Tac-Toe, and Blindfolded Pick-A-Club — as well as one hole and a bonus “closest to the pin” shot. Prizes will be awarded. All tickets include a special drink from the Scott Farm pop up bar, light snacks, and a souvenir gift. The Newton’s Curveball Concessions food cart will return as well, with all proceeds supporting the local community.
The public is also invited to purchase raffle tickets for a chance to win three prize packages of rare merchandise from the 2025 Masters and Ryder Cup tournaments, normally only available at the events themselves. Prizes include golf balls, ball markers, playing cards, a hat, and a mug. Entries are being sold online and at the event. Participation in Snow Golf is not necessary to enter the raffles.For more information, registration, and raffle tickets, visit landmarktrustusa.org/snow-golf.
Senior bowling roundup
• Week 4 of the winter/spring season of the Brattleboro Senior Bowling League at Brattleboro Bowl Jan. 29 saw Wayne’s World, Bad Boys and Slo Movers (all 13-7) in a three-way tie for first place, followed by Lucky 7 and Bowling Stones (both 12-8), Strikers (11-9), Spare Time (9-11), Candy Men (6-14), and Three Strikes and Serious (both 5-15).
Carol Gloski had the women’s high handicap game (291) and Shirley Aiken had the high handicap series (665). Robert Rigby had the men’s high handicap game (250) and Warren Corriveau Sr. had the high handicap series (693). Strikers had the high team handicap game (895) and Bad Boys had the high handicap series (2,489).
Kevin Napaver again had the men’s high scratch series (674) with games of 260 and 235, while Corriveau had a 647 series with games of 222, 214, and 211, and Rigby had a 639 series with games of 255 and 199. John Walker had a 635 series with games of 225, 209, and 201, Peter Deyo had a 587 series with games of 210 and 204. Milt Sherman had a 541 series and Stan Kolpa rolled a 193.
Gloski had the women’s high scratch series (515) and game (201), and Aiken rolled a 178.
Randolph T. Holhut, deputy editor of this newspaper, has written this column since 2010 and has covered sports in Windham County since the 1980s. Readers can send him sports information at news@commonsnews.org. Kevin O’Connor of VTDigger.org contributed to this report.
This Sports column by Randolph T. Holhut was written for The Commons.