Sports
Both varsity hockey teams play on home ice Saturday in a pair of league matchups, with the boys playing their last Eastern Athletic Conference game of the regular season. Be sure to support the girls’ basketball team during one (or all) of their three home games this week. The team plays at 4:30 p.m. today, Tuesday and Thursday.
Youth Hockey News
Youth hockey teams took home wins at all levels last weekend, with the Mites defeating Yarmouth twice on Saturday (5-3 and 2-1) and Gateway on Sunday (final score 3-1). The wins secured a playoff berth for the Mites.
The Peewees move to a 10-2-2 record after two wins against Gateway on Sunday. This month brings a bevy of challenges for the team in the forms of undefeated Nantucket and league-leading Lower Cape. The Vineyard takes on Lower Cape on home ice this Sunday at 9:30 a.m. and 11:50 a.m.
The commercial oyster season is underway, and the early reports from the Tisbury Great Pond in West Tisbury and Chilmark are good. Oyster fishermen in those towns are getting their daily limit, although the off-Island market is soft.
The retail price on Island fluctuates; this week wild oysters were selling for 50 cents apiece.
Eat Before Swim
A shark bite never felt so good.
This weekend the YMCA is celebrating all things Mako, the local swim team, of course.
On Saturday, Feb. 4, from 5:30 to 8 p.m. the Y turns into an Italian restaurant with a benefit pasta dinner prepared by Tea Lane Caterers; you supply the Billy Joel.
The cost is $15 for individuals and $45 for a family ticket. Tickets are available at the Y in advance and on the night of the event.
When Nat and Pam Benjamin and their two-year-old daughter Jessica sailed into Vineyard Haven Harbor in 1972, Nat wondered aloud to his family, “Wouldn’t it be nice to have a boatyard to fix up some of the wrecks around here and maybe build some new boats?”
Vineyarders are rightfully proud of the yearly abundance of oysters and scallops pulled from Island ponds, but little is made of what goes back into the water. Jessica Kanozak, creator of the Island’s nascent shell recovery program, hopes to change all that. After the first year of a pilot program on the Vineyard to return seashells to the sea, experts and community leaders met Saturday to discuss the program’s strengths, weaknesses and potential for expansion.