There should be few surprises for the Mount Alvernia girls volleyball team tonight even though the Mustangs enter unchartered territory in the Division 3 state semifinal against Notre Dame Academy of Tyngsboro. While several of the squad's nine seniors were only eighth-graders on junior varsity the last time Mount Alvernia won a sectional title in 2005, the Mustangs will face a familiar opponent in unfamiliar surroundings at Nashoba Regional tonight at 7. Mount Alvernia split a pair of five-set matches against Notre Dame during the regular season, with the Mustangs winning the first meeting in Tyngsboro and dropping the second at home.
 

The Waltham Hawks Squirt B youth hockey team, sponsored by Waltham Auto Body, won the Garden City Tournament, playing four times before edging Framingham 2-1 in a shootout for the title.
 

The Watertown High field hockey team had come too far - and gone too many games in a row without a loss - to see it end like this.  With the clock becoming a factor while facing a 1-0 deficit, the Raiders not only needed to get even, but they had to get angry to do it. When Erika Kelly popped a penalty-corner pass from senior Emily Sideris into the net with 15 seconds left in regulation, it saved the day for the Raiders and allowed them to fight another. The next challenge comes in the state semifinals where Watertown (19-0-2) faces South Sectional champion Canton (17-1-3) tomorrow at Canton High (5 p.m.).
 

The Waltham Track Club's youth cross country team had a very strong showing at the New England Junior Olympic Championships this past Sunday at Freestyle Farm in Amherst, N.H.
The Club achieved 13 personal records and 17 top-25 finishers, while qualifying three teams and five individuals for the Region 1 Junior Olympic Championships in Augusta, Maine next weekend.
 

Playing a team called the Ghosts on Friday the 13th proved to be a bad combination for the Waltham High football team. The Hawks made the long trip to Westford Academy Friday night with an eye toward securing their first Dual County League championship and enhancing their chances of a playoff game. Instead, they were hit with the worst loss of the season in a 42-6 walloping.

 

The tough part of the season is behind Newton North's Margo Gillis. From here on, the talented junior harrier is playing with house money after an already-remarkable debut cross country season.
 

It would have been difficult for Norwood High head football coach Joe Curran not to have a pang of hope in his heart while watching his team fall to Newton North 18-0 on the slip-n-slide turf that carpeted Boston College's Alumni Stadium. After all, even though his now 3-7 football team was losing, Curran was witnessing a team that was equally decimated by injuries this season, and that team has evened out its wins and losses columns after beginning the season 1-5.
 

As the Newton South football team traded punches with Acton-Boxboro in a scoreless first quarter, it looked like the Lions would be in for a tight contest with the host Colonials. South got close to grabbing the lead in the second quarter, landing on the 3-yard line with a first-and-goal. But three straight stops led to a field goal try, which A-B blocked. The rest of the night went much the same way for the Lions as the A-B rolled to a 27-0 victory.


 

A phone booth might have been a more appropriate dressing room for Erika Kelly during the second half of yesterday's Division 2 North field hockey championship game.
 

If the Watertown High football team was looking for momentum heading into Thanksgiving, it certainly didn't get it Friday night in a 42-0 loss to Wakefield at Victory Field.