Tom Fortier writes:
>   OK, now I know this doesn't sound like hockey stuff, but I was forced
>into this by my roommate.  He was wondering if anyone on this list would know
>if Tom Glavine, star pitcher of the Atlanta Braves, went to school somewhere
>in New England.  If he did, where did he go, and did he also play hockey?  For
>some reason, my roommate believes he went to college in New England somewhere,
>and that he also played college hockey.
 
Tommy Glavine never played college hockey or baseball.  He was
recruited to play both at Lowell, but then he was drafted by the LA
Kings in the NHL draft (4th round, if I remember correctly) and the
Atlanta Braves in the MLB draft (2nd round; ditto) in the summer of
1994 after graduating from high school, and he signed with Atlanta.  I
am almost positive that he never attended college, though I can't be
certain he didn't take some classes in the offseason.
 
Tommy played both sports at Billerica (Mass.) High School.  He was
selected as the best high school hockey player in the state of
Mass. his senior year, and he and Jon Morris of Chelmsford HS were 1-2
in the state in scoring with 91 and 85 points.  Both were recruited to
play at Lowell, and Morris would become the leading scorer in Hockey
East history, playing for the Chiefs from 1984-88.  Glavine would have
gone to Lowell too if he had not taken the Braves offer - I often
wonder what that Lowell team would have been like with both of these
guys.
 
Morris's 177 career points (HE games) may never be broken...because it
was set during a time when HE teams played as many as 34 league games
in a season, as compared to today's 24.  I suspect that Paul Kariya
(63 pts in 24 games in 1992-93) would have smashed Morris's record if
he'd stayed around, but players that good rarely do stay around.
 
Glavine is a year older than me, and his teams had some memorable
battles with my alma mater, Central Catholic HS of Lawrence.  The
reason I bring this up is that my alma mater tended to come out on
top :-) - especially when Glavine was a senior.  First his Billerica
hockey team had a 28-game regular season unbeaten streak snapped by
Central in a 5-4 win at Billerica's Hallenborg Rink.  Then when
baseball season rolled around, Central slammed Glavine for 8 runs in a
wild second inning that got the future Cy Young winner yanked in front
of a dozen major league scouts.  I have this vivid memory of Glavine
fidgeting around on the mound while his coach tried to drag time out
to get his reliever warm.  As Glavine stared down at his shoes, our
coach (Dave Bettencourt, who went on to coach UNH) told us, "Take a
good look...that's not going to happen to him often."  As usual, his
crystal ball was quite clear.
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                                            [log in to unmask]
Cabletron Systems, Inc.                                    *HMM* 11/13/93