Jamestowners find home on Narragansett teams



Student-athletes at Narragansett High School include Michael McGrady, from left, Grace McGrady, Mollie McGrady, Lindsey Broomhead, Corey Pierce and Olivia Rogers. The Jamestown teens participate on the hockey, cross-country, track, swim, lacrosse and soccer teams. PHOTO BY MATT WUNSCH

Student-athletes at Narragansett High School include Michael McGrady, from left, Grace McGrady, Mollie McGrady, Lindsey Broomhead, Corey Pierce and Olivia Rogers. The Jamestown teens participate on the hockey, cross-country, track, swim, lacrosse and soccer teams. PHOTO BY MATT WUNSCH

With the winter sports season entering the fourth quarter, students and coaches are preparing for the next phase of the 2018-19 schedule.

At Narragansett High School, that includes six athletes from Jamestown.

Corey Pierce, an eight-year resident, will spend the entire school year running. His schedule includes cross-country in the fall, indoor track in the winter and outdoor track in the spring. Pierce is looking forward to the outdoor season so he can run the 200-meter and 400-meter dashes, along with the 4×400-meter relay. He likes sprinting more than the grueling races.

“I’m not really great at distance,” said the junior, “but I’m not the slowest either.”

Pierce chose Narragansett because of its intimate size compared to North Kingstown, which is Jamestown’s other high school of record, saying it creates a better learning environment for him. There are 99 students in Narragansett’s class of 2020; in comparison, there are 365 juniors at North Kingstown.

“It was mostly for academic reasons,” he said. “I knew I was going to get more help here.”

Olivia Rogers, a lifelong Jamestowner, also is a year-round runner. As a freshman, Rogers ran cross-country during the fall and is competing in the 1,000 meters this season. The indoor team is 6-5.

“The cross-country team did pretty well this year,” she said, “although we would have done better if we had more people on the team. The indoor team is actually doing really well. We’ve had a lot of girls winning a lot of medals.”

Rogers plans to run the 800-meter event when the outdoor season commences in April. She echoed Pierce’s reason for choosing Narragansett versus North Kingstown.

“I thought that would be better for me because I am quiet,” she said. “And for academic reasons. I thought I could get more help here.”

As for her hometown, the lowkey feel coincides with her high school of choice.

“I like how I can walk to pretty much anywhere from my house,” she said. “Like to the beach.”

From the beach to the pool, junior Lindsey Broomhead said the swim team has been struggling following its transfer to the Valerio league.

“We have had a rough year after moving up a division,” said the native Jamestonwer. “We also had a lot of injuries and swimmers who were out sick.”

Broomhead is more optimistic about the spring season, which is when she will grab her lacrosse stick and start competing on dry land.

“With the group of seniors we have this year, we have a chance to win the division,” she said.

Freshman Michael McGrady, a Narragansett Avenue resident whose family owns Dutch Harbor Boat Yard, has joined his twin sisters, lacrosse players Grace and Mollie, among the athletes on South Pier Road. A three-sport athlete, McGrady played soccer during the fall. The Mariners finished 3-12-3 in Division II during a rebuilding season.

“We struggled a bit at soccer this year because we had a lot of freshmen,” he said. “Many of the other teams in our division had older players. I’m thinking we’re going to be a lot better over the next few years.”

While the soccer season was disappointing, McGrady is having more success on the ice by playing hockey on the co-op team between Narragansett and Chariho.

“We’ve won more games this year than anyone thought we would,” he said. “We’ve kind of been the sleeper team.”

McGrady is a defenseman who has been playing hockey since he first laced up the skates when he was 4. Despite that long affair with Canada’s game, lacrosse still is his passion when it comes to sports. It runs in the family; his brother, J.P., was named captain of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute squad last week.

“I’ve been playing lacrosse on travel teams pretty much my whole life,” he said. “I like lacrosse the most out of the three.”

Matt Mahar, the athletic director, said Narragansett provides graduating Lawn School students with the chance to play right away.

“It’s great that there’s opportunities for kids here as freshmen and sophomores to step in and play on a varsity team right away as opposed to going to a bigger school where there’s a lot more competition and less chance to play,” he said. “Plus, we have awesome facilities here and it’s a great school that has a private school feel.”