Medway/Millis/Holliston/Milford gymnasts reach new heights, take 4th at New Englands
Caleigh Wilson started gymnastics in fourth grade.
For the first half-decade of the Milford senior's career, it was an individual pursuit in club programs. Be the best, better than the people around you.
She always wanted Milford to have a gymnastics team, so she could represent her town and school in the sport she loved.
The Scarlet Hawks joined the burgeoning Medway/Holliston/Millis co-op program just in time for her freshman year.
"I've never been able to be a part of one until my freshman year," said Wilson, who also plays soccer and runs track for Milford. "I was happy with the dynamic of the team. It's really positive. My best friends are on that team."
MHMM, as the co-op is known colloquially and on official score sheets, reached rare heights this winter. The program qualified for the New England championships for just the second time in its 10-year existence. They finished fourth after also taking fourth in the team state championships and second at the South sectional meet.
"It’s a great way of having gymnastics not as an individual sport. Growing up in the club programs, it’s more of an individual thing. High school gymnastics is really about the team," said Holliston senior and captain Emmeline Stoetzel, who has been with the program for three years and participating in gymnastics for 12. "We all got really close, especially this year it’s a really good team environment and still the same sport."
"I never had that opportunity"
That desire to represent more than the individual birthed the program in the first place. Breanna Vacca graduated from Medway in 2010 but never had the opportunity to compete in high school gymnastics because her school lacked a team. She tried to fight for a team, but was told to join the cheerleading team.
"Which is very different from gymnastics," Vacca said. "They're completely different sports."
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After graduating from Keene State in 2014, a coworker asked Vacca if she would be interested in coaching a team. Vacca asked if the school would even allow it. Heather Cronin, Vacca's eventual co-head coach, had gathered enough interested athletes to start the program.
"It was great to give back to the high school that I went to and give these kids the opportunity to compete for their high school when I never had that opportunity," Vacca said.
The program began as a Medway/Millis operation and added Holliston in its second year, the last time the team qualified for New Englands. Milford joined the mix in 2020.
With the co-op's necessity to sustain numbers, Vacca rarely runs tryouts. MMHM practices and hosts home meets at Elite Gymnastics in Ashland, where Vacca also coaches and many of the athletes compete during the club season.
"At first we didn’t really know a lot of people on the team. We became close really quickly. Having different schools doesn’t make that much of a difference," Stoetzel said. "We don’t practice at a school, we practice at a gym. It’s not a problem."
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Getting the schools themselves on the same page can be more challenging than the athletes. Medway is the school/town technically running the co-op, but the program tries to rally all four of its communities to support the team.
"We're happy to have everybody"
Outside of the team aspect, high school gymnastics varies wildly from club competition. Vacca only has the athletes for three months, and they compete in 12 meets over that time. Compare that to a club schedule with one meet per month. It doesn't leave much time to teach new athletes the intricacies of the sport. Though MMHM doesn't cut anyone, only so many can compete during the meets, six per apparatus, and only two gymnasts can be in all four events (floor, vault, bars and beam).
"It’s hard to teach someone how to do gymnastics within two months," Vacca said. "We encourage everyone to stay because they’re on a team, they can be part of that aspect. We’re happy to have everybody."
They're all happy to be with each other, too. Individual school designations melt away once the gymnasts enter the same gym. They all spend so much time together before, during and after meets at pasta dinners and fundraisers.
"It's pretty impossible not to get close with each other," Stoezel said.
That closeness is largely what propelled MMHM to its success. Vacca and her staff encourage the each other during competition. The meets get loud.
"The energy is really positive," Wilson said.
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"The peak of their gymnastics careers"
MMHM went 6-1 during the regular season and won the Tri-Valley League championship for the second year in a row.
"We had a lot of people hitting the peak of their gymnastics careers and hitting new skills," Stoetzel said. "Over the course of the season we improved a lot. It was all the extra practice and work we were doing."
A measurable portion of that work focused on the balance beam. Many athletes struggled to stay on it at the start of the season. Vacca and her staff zeroed in on that apparatus, and MMHM found its center.
"It became my best event, which is not super typical for me," Stoetzel said. "That change in everybody's confidence is a really good moment."
Stoetzel and Wilson led the team as senior captains. She competes in three events (vault, beam and floor), while Wilson was named the TVL senior of the year.
"They paved the way," Vacca said. They led the team whether they were in the lineup or not."
All they needed was the opportunity.
Contact Kyle Grabowski at kgrabowski@gannett.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @kylegrbwsk.
This article originally appeared on MetroWest Daily News: MMHM co-op allows gymnasts to compete for their schools and themselves
