A farewell to five

Chris Piganelli, Korey Morgan, Graham Pickard, Nicolas Crescenzi and Brett Langlois are honoured by teammates and fans at the graduation game on Wednesday February 18. (Photo by/ Chelsea Lefler)

Five LaSalle Vipers will be graduating from the team at the end of this season.

In order to be eligible to play in the Greater Ontario Junior Hockey League players must be between the ages of 16 and 21. Players Nicolas Crescenzi, Korey Morgan, Brett Langlois, Chris Piganelli and Graham Pickard were honoured for their graduation on Wednesday Feb. 18 at their game, against the Sarnia Legionnaires.

“It’s definitely sad to see this chapter of my life come to an end, but I’ll always be a Viper after so, it’s definitely something that I’m going to take with me for the rest of the time,” said Viper’s Captain Brett Langlois.

Langlois said school is now his main focus and is pursuing his career as an electrician at St. Clair College.

Chris Piganelli, the longest active Viper on the roster, said although he is also sad to go, he is ready to move on.

“It’s going to feel a little weird, knowing I’m not going to be able to play in front of a crowd again, but life goes on and you have other things to do,” said Piganelli. Piganelli said he may continue his hockey career, but school is his main focus right now. “I’ve kept it open but I have to go year by year with my school schedule, because obviously school comes first.”

Dan Beaudoin, an 18-year-old player on the team who has been playing for the Vipers for three years. He said even though they’re losing good players, they’ll gain more.

“Obviously it’s going to hurt a little bit, since we’re losing a lot of important key guys, but in the past few years we’ve lost like pretty much half of our team every single year. So I don’t think it’s something that we can’t handle,” said Beaudoin.

Beaudoin said he thinks even without these players, they’ll manage next year and bring in new recruits who will benefit the team.

With graduation on their minds, the Viper’s continued to play hard throughout the night, but the team ended up losing 6-3 against the Legionnaires Wednesday night.

The graduates will continue to play a pivotal part for the Viper’s as they push for the upcoming playoffs.