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November 15, 2023BY BILL DOYLE
CFP CORRESPONDENT
On Oct. 31, the St. John’s High School golf team won its eighth state championship and its first since Joe Plante helped the Pioneers repeat as state champs in 2012.
Joe Plante, 28, died unexpectedly on Oct. 23, but St. John’s coach Sean Noonan believes he helped the Pioneers win their latest state title as well.
“You can’t tell me he wasn’t looking down from above,” Mr. Noonan said. “That’s what I believe.”
St. John’s junior varsity golf coach Tim Williams and middle school golf coach John Jeniski taught Joe at St. John’s. Both play often at Heritage Country Club, the Charlton club which is owned by Joe’s father, Bill Plante, and where Joe worked as a teaching pro and in the pro shop and where St. John’s conducts tryouts each golf season. Mr. Noonan didn’t coach at St. John’s when Joe played for the Pioneers, but he was a teaching pro at Heritage in the 1990s when Joe was a young boy.
“He was the sweetest kid,” Mr. Noonan said.
Mr. Noonan received a call about Joe Plante’s death while St. John’s played that day in the Central Mass. Division 1 tournament at Pleasant Valley Country Club. He didn’t tell the team until after it had won the title. A few days later, the coaches attended Joe Plante’s wake together at St. Joseph Parish in Charlton.
Before the state championship match at GreatHorse in Hampden, Mr. Jeniski texted Bill Plante to inform him the team would have Joe’s initials and graduation year, ’13, embroidered in the school colors of red and white with a purple ribbon on their Titleist golf caps.
“At a time when we were all hurting so bad, it was quite a lift,” Bill Plante said.
Mr. Jeniski brought one of the caps, which were embroidered at no charge by a mother of a St. John’s student, to Mr. Plante’s home and reminded him that St. John’s hadn’t won a state golf championship since Joe’s senior year when his score was the tiebreaker. Mr. Jeniski told him that the team needed Joe to help it win another one.
At the state championship match, senior Nic Gebhardt and junior Ronan Mooney each shot a 3-over 75, junior Savar Bhasin carded a 76 and senior Curtis McDonald and sophomore Cael Duggan each shot a 77. Only the top four scores counted so St. John’s finished with a team total of 303 strokes, a whopping 11 fewer than runner-up St. John’s Prep of Danvers and 12 less than Xaverian Brothers of Westwood, both of which compete in the Catholic Conference with St. John’s.
Nic never met Joe Plante, but he said the team prayer before the match focused on keeping him in the Pioneers’ thoughts as they played.
“When you have somebody in your mind,” Nic said, “or somebody that you know or you think is following you, it’s a comforting feeling and it helps you stay calm.”
“We do truly have the deepest and best team in the state,” Curtis said, “and I think Joe was definitely there in spirit and looking over us and giving us the courage and strength to win.”
Bill Plante was at Heritage the day St. John’s played in the state championship and someone asked him if he had seen or felt any kind of sign from his son since he passed away. Sadly, he said he hadn’t.
Within 30 seconds of saying that, Mr. Jeniski texted to say St. John’s had won the state championship while wearing Joe’s initials on their caps. He took that as a sign from above from his son.
“He was around us,” Mr. Noonan said of Joe. “I could tell he was out there because everyone was calm, everyone was confident. We had six kids in the top 42, that’s amazing to me.”
The state championship brought some degree of comfort to Bill Plante, his wife Cheryl and their daughter Sarah. Joe would have turned 29 on Nov. 3.
“For them to win,” Mr. Plante said, “that was such a sign and a feeling for all of us that Joe is in a good place and he was with them that day. It was unbelievable.”
“It makes us feel like we did not only our job, which is trying to win,” Nic said, “but we also helped out another family in doing so ... once you go to St. John’s everyone is like family there.”
Bill Plante graduated from St. John’s in 1983 and he’s a member of the St. John’s Athletic Hall of Fame for his football and basketball expertise. Joe used to tease his father that he had won two more state championships than him.
St. John’s finished the regular season with a 16-1 record, including 9-1 in the Catholic Conference to finish in first place. The Pioneers suffered their only loss to Xaverian by one stroke via a tiebreaker with the seventh card.
In addition to the varsity, nearly 35 more students played for the school’s 9-0 middle school and two junior varsity teams.
Mr. Noonan likes to have as many students in the golf program as possible.
“You never know when a kid is going to excel at golf,” he said. “It’s not like other sports.”
Mr. Noonan pointed to senior Curtis as a prime example. Curtis didn’t play in any varsity matches during his first three years in the program, but he made the varsity this fall and shot a 79 in the Central Mass. championship and a 77 in the state championship.
“He just kept working at it, working at it,” Mr. Noonan said, “and this year not only was he a vital part of the team, he helped us with a state championship, and he had never played in a varsity match until August.”
“The coaches saw something in me that I really didn’t see,” Curtis said.
During the state tournament, Mr. Noonan sat captains Tim Breen and Matt Lemay, who he believed were strong enough golfers to play for any other team in the state, but who weren’t in St. John’s top six.
“They were the biggest cheerleaders of the program,” Mr. Noonan said. “To me, that means they get it. You’ve got to sacrifice for the greater good of the team. I’m sure they were upset, but they never came to me asking why they weren’t playing.”
“Not playing wasn’t really a huge concern of mine,” Tim said, “because I know how talented our team was and the contributions made from every single kid on the team, one through 13, led to that championship and everyone should feel proud of it.”
Usually, Mr. Noonan waits at least a couple of weeks after the season to decide if he will return as coach the following year, but as soon as St. John’s won the state title he made up his mind to be back next fall.
“I’ve got a sophomore and two juniors who were looking at me,” he said. “I can’t leave these guys.”
