Longtime coach Enfield was surprised by the team after their 500th win

Brian Mazzone believes in villains. So when he handed a bunch of signs commemorating Enfield baseball coach Jay Gaucher’s 500th victory to one of the players on the bench in the top of the seventh inning in Monday’s game against RHAM, thought he would have done it too soon, even if Enfield. increased by four runs.

“I think I’m a jerk in everything — you’re in the wrong place, it’s a jerk,” said Mazzone, Enfield’s assistant baseball coach. “So in the top of the seventh, I say to one of the kids on the bench, ‘When we win, you have to let them out.’

“Then they got the bases loaded with one out, I was like, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’

He laughed. Went. Reliever Ryan Senn finished the game with a strikeout and a pop-up, and Enfield won 4-0. The players surprised Gaucher by throwing ice at him and everyone posed for pictures with 500 win signs.

The 500 wins are in four sports – football, softball, girls basketball and baseball, all of which Gaucher has coached at Enfield High for more than 27 years.

Mazzone, who played football for Gaucher as a student at Enfield High and has known him since 1993, is a numbers guy. He coached baseball with Gaucher for the past seven years and began to wonder how many wins the head coach had.

So he did some research. Gaucher coached football from 2000-2015, softball from 2001-03, girls basketball from 2017-present and baseball from 2004-2013 and 2017-present. Mazzone looked all over, even finding conference tournament wins, and found that as of last week, Gaucher had a total of 498 wins.

The Eagles (14-6) lost to Hall on Thursday but beat Lewis Mills 5-2 on Friday for 499. RHAM (17-2) stood in the way on Monday and Enfield already lost to the Raptors with 5-4 on May 3rd. .

Gaucher had no idea what was going on, but Mazzone told the kids and invited Gaucher’s wife and two daughters to the game. Some of the girls basketball players also showed up.

“It was cool because I honestly never looked at my record practice,” Gaucher said. “I just loved coaching and working with the kids and seeing them grow and have opportunities to win. It was nice that Brian took some time and effort to go through all those baseball, softball and football, basketball records to figure out how many wins we’ve been to.”

Jake Lubanski was the winning pitcher for Enfield on Monday (Gaucher said, “He did a good job getting out of some jams”). Junior Jack Raymond had a two-run single, sophomore Gavin Sampson and senior Ryan Dennis had an RBI double in the final game of the regular season.

“I was glad they finished the season strong,” Gaucher said. “It’s a great group of young people. I’ve been blessed with some really good leaders along with the young ladies and young men I’ve coached.”

Gaucher started coaching football first, then in 2001, the school needed a softball coach, so he took over for a few years. He had played baseball and knew it better than softball, which he enjoyed, but when the baseball job came up, he took it. She remembers coaching Andrea Silva in softball, who is Enfield’s current softball coach.

His girls basketball teams have been his most successful, advancing to the state semifinals five times, including four times from 2015-2018. He has 183 wins in that sport.

Gaucher’s two daughters, a sixth-grader and a sophomore, play high-level sports, so there’s a lot to juggle with his family.

“My wife Stacey was a saint through it,” Gaucher said. “Without her, this would never have happened. This spring was crazy, but I made it work. I appreciate that my family is flexible.”

Mazzone, who has coached with and against Gaucher over the years, was happy to honor his friend.

“It’s not often recognized,” Mazzone said. “I think when someone does good things, they should be recognized.”