Former athletes enshrined in Wareham Hall of Fame
Seven athletes and an entire team across an array of different sports and generations have been nominated for the Wareham High School Hall of Fame Class of 2014.
The inductees selected by the Wareham High School Hall of Fame Committee are as follows:
Patrick Schultz—hockey and baseball (1990s)
Larry Senna—cross country, basketball and track (1980s). Senna is currently the program coordinator at the Wareham Boys and Girls Club.
"It's pretty cool. There have been plenty of great athletes to go through Wareham so it's an honor," Senna said about his nomination.
He said one of his favorite memories was on the basketball team his senior year when the team squeaked into the playoffs and pulled off a cinderella run to the state championship game.
"Everybody expected us to lose so we had no worries." he said.
Despite being the basketball team's top scorer, Senna's true calling was as a distance runner. He said he never lost a dual meet his junior or senior year and was ranked as high as 12th in the state in cross country.
"I loved running in the woods," he said.
For outdoor track in the spring, Senna still holds the school two-mile record with a time of nine minutes, 56 seconds.
When asked what advice he would give to current Wareham athletes, Senna said, "Respect the game, respect each other and be humble. Try you best no matter what."
Gilbert “Dobie” Franklin—Coach, football and basketball (1980s-2012)
Marty Cardoza—football, basketball and baseball (1970s). Cardoza played on the 1976-77 basketball coached by Jim Brogioli (whom Wareham High School recently named its basketball court for). That team beat Ipswich 65-54 to capture the Eastern Massachusetts crown before losing in the state championship game to to Notre Dame of Fitchburg by the score of 84-81. Until 2010 that was the deepest playoff run of any Wareham basketball team.
Leonard Lopes—football, basketball and baseball (1960s). Lopes was the namesake for the Leonard Lopes playground in Onset.
Ed Monteiro Sr.—football, basketball, baseball and track (1950s). Monteiro was part of the Wareham football dynasty in the 1950s when the team was coached by the legendary Clem Spillane, namesake of Spillane Field. The football team only lost two games during Monteiro's time at Wareham.
One of those teams was the 1954 football team, which is being inducted as an entire team into the Wareham Hall of Fame. That team existed in the middle of an 11 year stretch from 1952 to 1963 where Wareham dominated the South Coast and posted an 11-0-1 record against Bourne in the annual Thanksgiving rivalry game.
Frank Mott—football, basketball and baseball (1940s).
The induction ceremony will take place on Saturday, Nov. 29 at 5 p.m. at Salerno’s Function Hall, 196 Onset Ave. Tickets will be on sale in October at Wareham High School.