Lacrosse Notes: Portsmouth-Souhegan matchup was first meeting as coaches for Curro sisters

There aren't many days that go by where McKinley Sbordone doesn't communicate with her younger sister, JoJo Curro.

Whether its a text or a phone call, Sbordone and Curro are usually in touch about the day-to-day things that are going on in their lives, most recently about being first-time high school girls lacrosse coaches.

But in the week leading up to last Saturday's game between Souhegan and Portsmouth, the teams that each is now coaching, respectively, there was nothing but silence.

"It was strange because we talk every day, especially being in our new roles, and we didn’t speak once this week," Sbordone said. "We both wanted it bad. I’m proud of her for what she is doing and I think Portsmouth is lucky to have a coach like her. She’s stepping into really big shoes because Mary Squire was a very successful coach."

Squire, who stepped down after winning leading the Clippers to their third-straight Division II title in 2019, won five titles and made the final seven times in her 10 years as Portsmouth's coach.

But Sbordone is trying to fill some large shoes as well at Souhegan, a pair she and her sister are a little more familiar with seeing on the sideline.

Both played at Souhegan for Maren Petropulos, who had planning on retiring after the 2020 season and was the head coach for the Sabers for 25 years. Petropulos led Souhegan to three Division I titles, most recently in 2018, and her teams made seven appearances in the championship game.

"We’ve established such an amazing program within Amherst," Sbordone said. "It really is community wide and we have so much support. Coming into a position and filling somebody’s role of 25 years, that’s hard, but I’ve been welcomed with open arms. There are still so many people who are giving back to the sport when I was playing."

Sbordone, who graduated from Souhegan in 2006, and Curro, who did so two years later, coach together for Granite State Elite, and played against each other in college when the older sister was at Boston University and the other at the University of New Hampshire.

This was the first time they had coached against each other.

"I thought after college and having to compete against each other at BU and UNH, I thought that was going to be the last time we were against each other on the field," Curro said. "Things happen and opportunities opened up for both of us. I talked to her about coaching at Portsmouth and she talked to me about the job at Souhegan."

While this game came about in part due to scheduling changes brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, both hope that it can become a fixture on their calendars for years to come, even though the programs are in different divisions.

Scheduling conundrum

Ever since his early days coaching at Bishop Guertin, Chris Cameron has tried to fill out the Cardinals' schedule with games against out-of-state opponents.

For the first couple years, he'd reach out to just about anyone to try to find the best competition he could, like Duxbury, Mass., one of the first to agree. The teams played 13 times, with the Dragons winning the first nine times and the Cardinals the next four, the last of which was in 2019.

"Duxbury was the first one to play us and I had to beg," Cameron said. "No body wanted to play a team from New Hampshire. Then it got to the point where I had 15 or 16 teams who wanted to play. It was a compliment that everyone wanted to play us."

At times, Cameron would take the team on the road for a weekend, playing teams from Connecticut, New Jersey and New York. Other times, those teams have traveled to New Hampshire, including in 2018, when Bishop Guertin played Mercer Island, a team from just outside of Seattle.

This year, with the COVID-19 pandemic still affecting scheduling and travel, Cameron tried to find a few teams to add to the Cardinals schedule.

"Connecticut lost New York (teams)," he said. "They’re right there, they’re in New England, we can play them. I had home-and-home agreements with Darien and New Canaan, which was awesome, but then they couldn’t play out of state."

Cameron contacted a few teams from Rhode Island, but with their preseason not starting until April 26, they'd be almost a month behind Bishop Guertin in terms of preparation. A couple of teams from Massachusetts, like Hingham and Lincoln-Sudbury, were holding out hope but weren't able to work something out.

On Saturday, Bishop Guertin will play its lone out-of-state game, when it travels to Maine to face Cape Elizabeth.

"What it is, I’m just happy we’re out here playing," Cameron said. "It’s going to be something like early in my career here, when we didn’t have the out-of-state games, it was like what are we going to do here. We’ve got to make sure we’re not just going to sit back and not get better. You can easily fall into that trap and not get better. Those games make you better and they’re fun. They’re great to play."

Coming back

After beating Souhegan 15-5 on Tuesday, Bedford coach Matt Johansmeyer talked about the challenge many teams are facing this season in playing an opponent twice each week.

"I expect a big one out of them for Thursday," the Bulldogs coach said. "Same team in three days poses challenges. It’s definitely a mental game trying to keep the focus right and compete with each other at practice."

During the first week of the season, Bedford defeated Concord 20-8 in the first meet and then went on the road to play the Crimson Tide and escaped with a 4-3 win.

It happened again this week, as the Bulldogs fell behind early against Souhegan. The Sabers led 9-4 in the final minutes of the third quarter, but Bedford made it 9-7 going into the fourth, and after tying the game late in regulation, Will Kramer scored in overtime to give the Bulldogs the win.

Bedford hosts Londonderry on Saturday at 11:30 a.m.