"Thirty years later" feature

Hi everyone. I've been lurking for a little bit, but I wanted to post this to see what people think could be better.

My assignment: write 100 lines on the a small town that beat a big town for the state title, 30 years ago. It's a feature for a metro weekly focused on a particular area of the state, hence all the references to towns.

Can't thank you enough for the feedback. Glad to be here, and I'm ready to learn.

***

Jimmy O'Keefe remembers the game like it was yesterday. So too does Randy Boyle. Same with Rick Wood.

Thirty years ago, they were the young hockey heroes of Hudson, celebrating their stunning Division 1 state title win on the famed Boston Garden ice.

On Saturday, the trio stood in Section 120 at the DCU Center in Worcester.

As they watched O'Keefe's son, Sean, and his teammates battle Gardner for the Division 3 Central crown, they shared memories. In 1978, they beat Burlington, becoming the last public high school team to win a state championship in hockey.

It was a thriller in front of thousands of fans. O'Keefe, 48, vividly recalled the winning goal. Mark Chiasson fired the shot. It was quick, and it was accurate.

“It was a wrister,” he said.

As O'Keefe finished his thought, Hawks captain Jon Gould fired a wrister of his own into the opposing net.

O'Keefe hollered, likewise Boyle and Wood. Around them, hundreds of Hudson fans, most clad in red and white, let up a massive cheer.

It recalled a scene from three decades ago. Ask Mike Nanartowich, Hudson's current coach.

In 1978, he was an 8th-grader at the Garden when the Hawks faced Burlington for the state championship. When Hudson won, he “danced around and acted like an idiot.” But it wasn't that much of a surprise. Like the rest of the town, he knew how talented the Hawks were.

But no one outside the area knew who the Hawks were – certainly not the broadcaster calling the game on television.

“He introduced us as the, 'Hudson ... ahh ... Eagles... well, there's a big bird on their chest,'” recalled Boyle, 48, who lives in Hudson and owns a construction company in town.

At the time, the Hawks had proven themselves the best team in Central Massachusetts. The previous year, they made a run to the state final, but lost to powerhouse Matignon, 4-2, at the Eastern States Coliseum in West Springfield. Though that didn't matter to anyone from the East, Hudson knew they had something special.

“We put up a pretty good fight against Matignon, in a time when the Central and West representative was overwhelmed by the Eastern team. Period for period, we stayed right with them,” said their coach, Peter Van Buskirk. “We were excited coming in. We had a good group of athletes.”

The Hawks knew what they had to do win. But nine games into the season, they weren't doing it.

“We were 6-3, but we weren't playing our best hockey,” recalled Paul Filipe, the team's star defenseman who went on to play at Northeastern, where he is a member of the school's athletic hall of fame.

So Filipe and his fellow seniors called a players-only meeting at O'Keefe's house. They had all grown up together, playing on the same youth hockey, football and baseball teams, skating on the same ponds for hours, and playing in countless practices and games.

“We decided we had to buckle up, and we did,” said Filipe, 48, who lives in Lynnfield and works for a software company. “We went onto win 15 in a row.”

The Hawks finished 21-3, behind a fast, cohesive group that featured forwards Kevin Cyr, Boyle and Paul Polange, a defense led by Filipe and Tommy Rand, and a backup-goalie-turned-starter, Lorne Colena, who wasn't supposed to be in the spotlight.

Wood, team's starting goaltender, suffered a knee injury during football season. “Ricky was 6-foot-3, athletic, the captain of the football team. Lorne was solid, but not a starter,” said Van Buskirk, 65, now the Holy Cross women's coach.

Still, the Hawks beat St. Peter-Marian (Central Mass) and Springfield Cathedral (state semifinals) on their way to the state final. Burlington toppled Matignon to win the Eastern championship. “They were pretty fired up by beating Matignon. They might have thought we were just some small town from Central Mass,” said Filipe.

They weren't fazed by the Eastern powerhouse, but they had eyes like dinner plates when they saw the an empty Garden fill with fans.

“We went out for our pregame skate, and there was no one in the building,” said Boyle. “We went to get ready, and as we came back out, there was almost a packed house.”

“I was out of my mind, with all those people there,” said Wood, 48, a construction worker and Hudson native.

The game see-sawed. The Hawks dominated at the outset, but Burlington stormed back and tied it late in the third period.

In overtime, Van Buskirk tapped Chiasson's line, who was on the ice when Burlington's Jeff Cowles scored the tying goal. “We felt pretty bad about that,” said Chiasson, 48, who now works in the Hudson High technology department. “Three minutes to go, we're looking at a state championship and we let up the tying goal.”

Chiasson lined up at the top of the circle, behind O'Keefe and right winger Peter Millett.

It was March 20, 1978. Bobby Orr's birthday. Eight years earlier, they watched as Orr scored to win the Stanley Cup for the Bruins. Now, they were in Boston Garden, with 1:29 left in overtime, trying to block out the shouting of fans who had traveled from Hudson in more than 15 buses and dozens of cars.

O'Keefe won the faceoff, and passed to Chiasson. His shot sailed under the crossbar, and the Garden ice became a blur of sticks and gloves as families and friends hugged in the stands.

The Hawks celebrated and piled on each other, mimicking their heroes, and Chiasson felt just like Bobby Orr.

In the hazy hours that followed, the mob of Hudson fans followed the team into the Garden locker room, and tailed them and a police escort through town. The convoy convened at the Poor Farm Lounge, where an all-night celebration ensued.

Chiasson recalls giving a radio interview the next morning, barely awake. The team later painted a mural on the side of the barn, commemorating the win.

Though the Poor Farm was torn down, and storage units now occupy the space, no one in town has forgotten. The largest banner in the Hudson High gymnasium reads, “1978 Division 1 State Champions.”

“You don't really fully appreciate it until afterwards, and then you wish you could go back,” said Van Buskirk. “It was such a stunning victory. It goes by you really quickly. The locker room, the people, there were just so many people. There wasn't a moment in the game where anyone could relax, and the way it just ended, it exploded so quickly, and dissipated in the air before we could sit back and realize ... we just won the Division 1 title here at the Boston Garden.”

 

Damn. Hate to be that guy, but...been a week, anyone touching this?

 

Jimmy -

First, thanks for posting. Thanks as well for your patience. I've been in a kind of jam with a book since the first of the year, and am not able to devote as much time as I should to the Workshop. My apologies.

That said, I think this is a pretty solid piece of work. I'll make just a few short suggestions.

- In a feature this long, over 1100 words, I'm going to ask you for some brief physical descriptions of the subjects. Half a sentence each would do it if your details are well-chosen, precise and telling. In a story with so many different voices it's nice for the reader to be able to put a face or a behavioral characteristic with a name, rather than just an occupation. And no, it doesn't matter if the story is running with a picture.

- We start in scene at the Division 3 Central game, but don't really come back to it in a meaningful way.

- Avoid "like it was yesterday". It's trite, and too easy, and as a guy the same age as your interview subjects, I can tell you it isn't strictly true, either.

- Next time out on something like this, try to think of a narrative thread - a theme - that ties together a beginning, a middle and an end. For example, is this simply a reminiscence about a hockey game? Or is this A Single Event That Binds Four Men For Life? When you have time for pieces like these, try to think of the big ideas that underlie them.

- Speaking of which, I'd be very interested to know the nature and state of the relationships between these former teammates in the intervening years. I'd have asked about it.

- As a matter of story craft, game play retold thirty years after the fact, or how it was celebrated, is less interesting to me than the effect that game had on their lives since then. Has even one of these guys approached that kind of peak moment since?

Just some thoughts on a Wednesday night. But altogether a good piece of work.

Thanks again for sharing it with us.

 

Sir,

With pieces like this I always think of That Championship Season. (I wish I had seen TCS on Broadway. Though far from perfect and very slow-paced, clearly a stage adaptation, the first screen version is a decent sports flick with a great cast and no real sweat or games. The second is not as good and funnily enough Paul Sorvino is in both, but I digress). In these pieces, as in that play/film, you need to establish the guys now for us to care about them then.

Jimmy O'Keefe remembers the game like it was yesterday. So too does Randy Boyle. Same with Rick Wood. Show them remembering. How many reunions? Cross paths every day, ever fallen out of touch? Like mr macg suggests, establish the dynamic, right now they're three guys, are they three friends who talk every day, or three guys together for the first time in years, should know that off the top

Thirty years ago, they were the young hockey heroes of Hudson, celebrating their stunning Division 1 state title win on the famed Boston Garden ice.

On Saturday, the trio stood in Section 120 at the DCU Center in Worcester. Have them here as the lede, watching the son, the action in front of them, then remembering their youths. No sense saying "like it was yesterday, let them make be like yesterday ... three grown men watching boys play, remembering when they were boys themselves, wore the same colors, etc

As they watched O'Keefe's son, Sean, and his teammates battle Gardner for the Division 3 Central crown, they shared memories. In 1978, they beat Burlington, becoming the last public high school team to win a state championship in hockey.

It was a thriller in front of thousands of fans. O'Keefe, 48, vividly recalled the winning goal. Mark Chiasson fired the shot. It was quick, and it was accurate.

“It was a wrister,” he said. That's it? A wrist shot where, when, how?

As O'Keefe finished his thoughtDoesn't seem like much of a thought, took a second, Hawks captain Jon Gould fired a wrister of his own into the opposing net.

O'Keefe hollered, likewise Boyle and Wood. Around them, hundreds of Hudson fans, most clad in red and white, let up a massive cheer.

It recalled a scene from three decades ago. Actually it evoked a scene that they recalledAsk Mike Nanartowich, Hudson's current coach. Probably better if have him recalling it, rather than the imperative wording

In 1978, he was an 8th-grader at the Garden when the Hawks faced Burlington for the state championship. When Hudson won, he “danced around and acted like an idiot.” But it wasn't that much of a surprise. Like the rest of the town, he knew how talented the Hawks were.

But no one outside the area knew who the Hawks were – certainly not the broadcaster calling the game on television.

“He introduced us as the, 'Hudson ... ahh ... Eagles... well, there's a big bird on their chest,'” recalled Boyle, 48, who lives in Hudson and owns a construction company in town.

At the time, the Hawks had proven themselves the best team in Central Massachusetts. The previous year, they made a run to the state final, but lost to powerhouse Matignon, 4-2, at the Eastern States Coliseum in West Springfield. Though that didn't matter to anyone from the East, Hudson knew they had something special.

“We put up a pretty good fight against Matignon, in a time when the Central and West representative was overwhelmed by the Eastern team. Period for period, we stayed right with them,” said their coach, Peter Van Buskirk. “We were excited coming in. We had a good group of athletes.”

The Hawks knew what they had to do win. But nine games into the season, they weren't doing it.

“We were 6-3, but we weren't playing our best hockey,” recalled Paul Filipe, the team's star defenseman who went on to play at Northeastern, where he is a member of the school's athletic hall of fame.

So Filipe and his fellow seniors called a players-only meeting at O'Keefe's house. They had all grown up together, playing on the same youth hockey, football and baseball teams, skating on the same ponds for hours, and playing in countless practices and games. I'd probably like this earlier in the piece, a description of the chemistry between them, who's the leader, the funny guy, the reliable one, the wild card.

“We decided we had to buckle up, and we did,” said Filipe, 48, who lives in Lynnfield and works for a software company. “We went onto win 15 in a row.”

The Hawks finished 21-3, behind a fast, cohesive group that featured forwards Kevin Cyr, Boyle and Paul Polange, a defense led by Filipe and Tommy Rand, and a backup-goalie-turned-starter, Lorne Colena, who wasn't supposed to be in the spotlight.

Wood, team's starting goaltender, suffered a knee injury during football season. “Ricky was 6-foot-3, athletic, the captain of the football team. Lorne was solid, but not a starter,” said Van Buskirk, 65, now the Holy Cross women's coach.

Still, the Hawks beat St. Peter-Marian (Central Mass) and Springfield Cathedral (state semifinals) on their way to the state final. Burlington toppled Matignon to win the Eastern championship. “They were pretty fired up by beating Matignon. They might have thought we were just some small town from Central Mass,” said Filipe.

They weren't fazed by the Eastern powerhouse, but they had eyes like dinner plates when they saw the an empty Garden fill with fans.

“We went out for our pregame skate, and there was no one in the building,” said Boyle. “We went to get ready, and as we came back out, there was almost a packed house.”

“I was out of my mind, with all those people there,” said Wood, 48, a construction worker and Hudson native.

The game see-sawed. The Hawks dominated at the outset, but Burlington stormed back and tied it late in the third period.

In overtime, Van Buskirk tapped Chiasson's line, who was on the ice when Burlington's Jeff Cowles scored the tying goal. “We felt pretty bad about that,” said Chiasson, 48, who now works in the Hudson High technology department. “Three minutes to go, we're looking at a state championship and we let up the tying goal.”

Chiasson lined up at the top of the circle, behind O'Keefe and right winger Peter Millett.

It was March 20, 1978. Bobby Orr's birthday. Eight years earlier, they watched as Orr scored to win the Stanley Cup for the Bruins. Now, they were in Boston Garden, with 1:29 left in overtime, trying to block out the shouting of fans who had traveled from Hudson in more than 15 buses and dozens of cars.

O'Keefe won the faceoff, and passed to Chiasson. His shot sailed under the crossbar, and the Garden ice became a blur of sticks and gloves as families and friends hugged in the stands.

The Hawks celebrated and piled on each other, mimicking their heroes, and Chiasson felt just like Bobby Orr.

In the hazy hours that followed, the mob of Hudson fans followed the team into the Garden locker room, and tailed them and a police escort through town. The convoy convened at the Poor Farm Lounge, where an all-night celebration ensued.

Chiasson recalls giving a radio interview the next morning, barely awake. The team later painted a mural on the side of the barn, commemorating the win.

Though the Poor Farm was torn down, and storage units now occupy the space, no one in town has forgotten. The largest banner in the Hudson High gymnasium reads, “1978 Division 1 State Champions.”

“You don't really fully appreciate it until afterwards, and then you wish you could go back,” said Van Buskirk. “It was such a stunning victory. It goes by you really quickly. The locker room, the people, there were just so many people. There wasn't a moment in the game where anyone could relax, and the way it just ended, it exploded so quickly, and dissipated in the air before we could sit back and realize ... we just won the Division 1 title here at the Boston Garden.”

YD&OHS, etc

 

jd- Sorry I couldn't get this up when I actually wrote it, but for some reason I wasn't able to post anything for a while. My edits are in all caps, with a note at the end.

---
Jimmy O'Keefe remembers the game like it was yesterday. So too does Randy Boyle. Same with Rick Wood. (EITHER GO WITH ONE, OR GO ALL THREE AT ONCE: “THEY REMEMBER THE GAME LIKE IT WAS YESTERDAY.” I CAN’T MEET THREE CHARACTERS AT ONCE AND KEEP TRACK. ALSO, “LIKE YESTERDAY” IS A LITTLE CLICHÉ, AND “THE GAME” IS A LITTLE VAGUE: WHAT SPECIFICALLY DOES HE REMEMBER?)

Thirty years ago, they were the young hockey heroes of Hudson, celebrating their stunning Division 1 state title win on the famed Boston Garden ice. (SWITCH OUT HEROES FOR SOMETHING ELSE. AVOID HYPERBOLE IN HIGH SCHOOL WRITING, BUT IN A CASE LIKE THIS, I’D EVEN GO FOR “LEGENDS.” ALSO DITCH “FAMED.”)

On Saturday, the trio stood in Section 120 at the DCU Center in Worcester.

As they watched O'Keefe's son, Sean, and his teammates battle Gardner for the Division 3 Central crown, they shared memories. In 1978, they beat Burlington, becoming the last public high school team to win a state championship in hockey. (I FEEL LIKE THE LAST THREE GRAFS SHOULD BE ONE. MAYBE EVEN LEAD WITH THIS SCENE: THESE THREE, COMING FULL CIRCLE, WATCHING ONE OF THEIR SONS TRY FOR WHAT THEY DID AND RELIVING THEIR OWN GAME.)

It was a thriller in front of thousands of fans. O'Keefe, 48, vividly recalled the winning goal. Mark Chiasson fired the shot. It was quick, and it was accurate. (DITCH ACCURATE – UNECESSARY. IN HOCKEY YOU WANT TO KNOW HOW EXACTLY IT WENT IN. OVER A SHOULDER? FIVE-HOLE? SNUCK BETWEEN PAD AND POST?)

“It was a wrister,” he said.

As O'Keefe finished his thought, Hawks captain Jon Gould fired a wrister of his own into the opposing net.

O'Keefe hollered, likewise Boyle and Wood. Around them, hundreds of Hudson fans, most clad in red and white, let up a massive cheer.

It recalled a scene from three decades ago. Ask Mike Nanartowich, Hudson's current coach. (TOO MUCH REPETITION ON THE “30 YEARS” AND “RECALLED” STUFF. ALSO, REWRITE A DIFFERENT TRANSITION WITHOUT “ASK.”)

In 1978, he was an 8th-grader at the Garden when the Hawks faced Burlington for the state championship. (DITCH “IN 1978”) When Hudson won, he “danced around and acted like an idiot.” But it wasn't that much of a surprise. Like the rest of the town, he knew how talented the Hawks were.

But no one outside the area knew who the Hawks were – certainly not the broadcaster calling the game on television.

“He introduced us as the, 'Hudson ... ahh ... Eagles... well, there's a big bird on their chest,'” recalled Boyle, 48, who lives in Hudson and owns a construction company in town. (THIS IS A GREAT STORY, AND REVEALING. GET IT CLOSER TO THE TOP OF THE STORY.)

At the time, the Hawks had proven themselves the best team in Central Massachusetts. The previous year, they made a run to the state final, but lost to powerhouse Matignon, 4-2, at the Eastern States Coliseum in West Springfield. (LOCATION UNECESSARY) Though that didn't matter to anyone from the East, Hudson knew they had something special.

“We put up a pretty good fight against Matignon, in a time when the Central and West representative was overwhelmed by the Eastern team. Period for period, we stayed right with them,” said their coach, Peter Van Buskirk. (NOT A THRILLING QUOTE – REWRITE IN YOUR OWN WORDS) “We were excited coming in. We had a good group of athletes.” (A LITTLE BETTER. . . ANYTHING MORE COLORFUL FROM HIM?)

The Hawks knew what they had to do win. But nine games into the season, they weren't doing it.

“We were 6-3, but we weren't playing our best hockey,” recalled Paul Filipe, the team's star defenseman who went on to play at Northeastern, where he is a member of the school's athletic hall of fame.

So Filipe and his fellow seniors called a players-only meeting at O'Keefe's house. They had all grown up together, playing on the same youth hockey, football and baseball teams, skating on the same ponds for hours, and playing in countless practices and games. (PUT ME IN THAT MEETING. GET AS MUCH DETAIL AS YOU CAN, AND THAT, ALSO, COULD BE YOUR LEAD.)

“We decided we had to buckle up, and we did,” said Filipe, 48, who lives in Lynnfield and works for a software company. “We went onto win 15 in a row.” (REWRITE IN YOUR OWN WORDS)

The Hawks finished 21-3, behind a fast, cohesive group that featured forwards Kevin Cyr, Boyle and Paul Polange, a defense led by Filipe and Tommy Rand, and a backup-goalie-turned-starter, Lorne Colena, who wasn't supposed to be in the spotlight. (AGAIN, A LOT OF NAMES COMING AT ME, AND FEW OF THEM MEAN MUCH.)

Wood, team's starting goaltender, suffered a knee injury during football season. “Ricky was 6-foot-3, athletic, the captain of the football team. (USE YOUR OWN WORDS) Lorne was solid, but not a starter,” said Van Buskirk, 65, now the Holy Cross women's coach.

Still, the Hawks beat St. Peter-Marian (Central Mass) and Springfield Cathedral (state semifinals) on their way to the state final. Burlington toppled Matignon to win the Eastern championship. “They were pretty fired up by beating Matignon. They might have thought we were just some small town from Central Mass,” said Filipe.

They weren't fazed by the Eastern powerhouse, but they had eyes like dinner plates when they saw the an empty Garden fill with fans.

“We went out for our pregame skate, and there was no one in the building,” said Boyle. “We went to get ready, and as we came back out, there was almost a packed house.” (REWRITE IN YOUR OWN WORDS)

“I was out of my mind, with all those people there,” said Wood, 48, a construction worker and Hudson native.

The game see-sawed. (DITCH.) The Hawks dominated at the outset, but Burlington stormed back and tied it late in the third period. (SCORE? WHEN, HOW, WHO… WRITE THIS PART LIKE IT’S A STRAIGHT GAME STORY.)

In overtime, Van Buskirk tapped Chiasson's line, who was on the ice when Burlington's Jeff Cowles scored the tying goal. (UNCLEAR.) “We felt pretty bad about that,” said Chiasson, 48, who now works in the Hudson High technology department. “Three minutes to go, we're looking at a state championship and we let up the tying goal.”

Chiasson lined up at the top of the circle, behind O'Keefe and right winger Peter Millett.

It was March 20, 1978. Bobby Orr's birthday. Eight years earlier, they watched as Orr scored to win the Stanley Cup for the Bruins. Now, they were in Boston Garden, with 1:29 left in overtime, trying to block out the shouting of fans who had traveled from Hudson in more than 15 buses and dozens of cars. (ALL OF THIS IS INTERESTING, AND BELONGS IN THE STORY. BUT NOT HERE.)

O'Keefe won the faceoff, and passed to Chiasson. His shot sailed under the crossbar, and the Garden ice became a blur of sticks and gloves as families and friends hugged in the stands. (GOOD. COULD EVEN GO FURTHER WITH THAT DESCRIPTION.)

The Hawks celebrated and piled on each other, mimicking their heroes, and Chiasson felt just like Bobby Orr.

In the hazy hours that followed, the mob of Hudson fans followed the team into the Garden locker room, and tailed them and a police escort through town. The convoy convened at the Poor Farm Lounge, where an all-night celebration ensued.

Chiasson recalls giving a radio interview the next morning, barely awake. The team later painted a mural on the side of the barn, commemorating the win. (WITH PERMISSION? OR AS CELEBRATORY VANDALISM? EITHER WAY IT’S INTERESTING, AND I WANT A LOT MORE ABOUT IT. WHO DID IT? WHAT’D THEY PAINT?)

Though the Poor Farm was torn down, and storage units now occupy the space, no one in town has forgotten. (GOOD DETAIL. MAY WORK AS A WAY TO FRAME THE STORY. DITCH “NO ONE IN TOWN HAS FORGOTTEN.”) The largest banner in the Hudson High gymnasium reads, “1978 Division 1 State Champions.”

“You don't really fully appreciate it until afterwards, and then you wish you could go back,” said Van Buskirk. “It was such a stunning victory. It goes by you really quickly. The locker room, the people, there were just so many people. There wasn't a moment in the game where anyone could relax, and the way it just ended, it exploded so quickly, and dissipated in the air before we could sit back and realize ... we just won the Division 1 title here at the Boston Garden.” (THE LAST PART OF THE QUOTE IS SO GREAT, I’D REWRITE THE FIRST IN YOUR OWN WORDS: “VAN BUSKIRK SAID HE DIDN’T APPRECIATE THE CHAMPIONSHIP UNTIL AFTERWARDS. HE WISHES HE COULD GO BACK. ‘IT GOES BY YOU REALLY QUICKLY,’ HE SAID. ‘THERE WASN’T A MOMENT. . .’”)

---

jd- Good work here. I pretty much like everything about the story except the beginning. I've tried to point out a few moments I think you could start with, and really sketch them out in detail. Other things I wanted here: a bit more physical description of these guys, both then and now, and a bit of character detail about these guys.

One more note: I read a great story like this, almost identical in the plot, about a basketball game played in the 80's. The writer started with a moment in the game, when it looked like one team had it locked up. Then he brought us 20 years forward, to present day, and re-introduced those same characters as fully formed men, with a bit of biography about where they'd been since then. Then he went back to the game and brought us close to the end. Then he brought it back to the present again, before one last time going back to finish the game, and again to close out the present day. You're trying to do some of that, but sneaking-in what these guys do today seems to underdo it. Thirty years have passed. Presumably they have wives, kids, etc. Are they the same guys that won that game? Or have they changed?

The story I'm referring to is a bit more artful, leaves more chance you'll fall flat, and not every editor's going to go for it. But, given the information at hand and a weekly deadline, this story is good. Hope this helps, and feel free to post in the future.

-verbal