Celebrating our 100th Day of School and St. Valentine’s Day!

For the students at South Boston Catholic Academy, the past week was another special week full of great fun, activities, and letting all our families, friends, teachers, and staff know how much we care and appreciate them. The students had a chance to celebrate our 100th Day of School. What is the meaning of 100 school days? 100 School Days marks the 100th day of learning in the school year. It offers students and teachers time to reflect on the work done by students and allows schools to celebrate achievements and accomplishments. The students had a chance to think about all the different ways we can count up to 100 to celebrate our 100th Day of School! In Ms. Byrne’s class, they did 100th Day Exercisesincluding counting out 100 M&M’s. The older students made fanatic and interesting posters using their creativity and imagination. Each class celebrated its 100th day in unique and special ways.

We hope everyone had a wonderful St. Valentine’s Day! Saint Valentine is the patron saint of love. Believers say God worked through his life to perform miracles and teach people how to recognize and experience true love. This famous saint, an Italian doctor who later became a priest, inspired the creation of the holiday of sending letters/cards to those we love on St. Valentine’s Day. The students made Special Valentines with messages to their parent(s). The students had parties in their classrooms where they had a chance to exchange cards and candy with everyone in their class. Shout out to our Home and School Committee for all their great help and support, our awesome Student Council, who helped write, organize, and deliver candy grams for the students, and to Ms. Olsen, for her wonderful guidance and help with this year’s Students Council.

New families are welcome to email our admissions team at: admissions@sbcatholicacademy.org for more info. about South Boston Catholic Academy.

It’s that time of the year. We’re currently in the dead zone of the sports calendar. The NFL season is over. Regular season baseball has yet to begin. The NBA and NHL are still a few months away from the playoffs. And March Madness isn’t here quite yet. Golf is in full swing, but we’re still two weeks away from The Players Championship, and a little over a month away from The Masters. You know I’m a huge wrestling fan, but WrestleMania isn’t until April. And does anybody really care about the XFL or the USFL? I mean, how much football do we actually need? The XFL officially re-started last week. It used to be owned by Vince McMahon. Now it’s owned by The Rock. You can’t make this stuff up.

ESPN and FX are the home networks for the XFL every weekend. The league has two divisions, and a total of eight teams. It’s a 10-week regular season, with four teams making the playoffs. Those playoffs begin on Saturday, April 29. The XFL Championship Game is on Saturday, May 13 at the Alamodome in San Antonio. As for the USFL, their regular season begins on April 15. They also have two divisions, with a total of eight teams. And they also have a 10week season, which concludes in mid-June. The USFL games can be seen on FOX and NBC.

I think the thing that hurts the XFL and the USFL the most is that they’re both trying to be the same thing. They’re both trying to be the go-to professional football league during the NFL offseason. Unfortunately, the presence of both leagues at the same time makes for an overabundance of offseason football. We barely need one offseason football league. Nobody needs two.

The best way for these two leagues to handle their business would be to either join forces and create one league, or, they could do something truly unique and come together for a joint playoff format. Still, I can honestly tell you that I won’t be all that interested either way. For me, the football season is September through the Super Bowl in early February. That’s it. After that, I’m in standby mode for the MLB season to begin, and for the NBA and Stanley Cup Playoffs to start.

-Though, this year, I will have my eye on the World Baseball Classic, which begins on March 7. Team

USA’s first game is on March 11 against Great Britain.

There are 20 teams in this year’s WBC. It consists of four divisions. Team USA is in Pool C, along with Great Britain, Mexico, Canada, and Colombia. All of these games will take place in Phoenix. The other three divisions will play in Miami, Taiwan, and Tokyo. After their first game against Great Britain on March 11, USA takes on Mexico on March 12, then they play Canada on March 13, followed by their final Pool-Round game against Colombia on March 15.

The top-two teams in each Pool will advance to the Quarterfinals on March 17 and 18. Team USA’s Pool C will be matched up with Pool D in Miami, which consists of Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Israel, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic. Pools A and B will have their Quarterfinals on March 15 and 16 in Tokyo. Then, the four teams remaining will meet in the Semifinals in Miami on March 19 and 20. The WBC Championship Game will take place in Miami on March 21.

As for the Red Sox, they will have 12 players representing their respective countries in this year’s WBC. Those players are: Jorge Alfaro, C

(COL), Richard Bleier, LHP (ISR), Rafael Devers, INF (DR), Edwin Díaz, INF (PUR), Jarren Duran, OF (MEX), Kiké Hernández, INF/OF (PUR), Norwith Gudino, RHP (VEN – DPP), Rio Gomez, LHP (COL), Kenley Jansen, RHP (NED – DPP), Nick Pivetta, RHP (CAN), Alex Verdugo, OF (MEX), Masataka Yoshida, OF (JPN).

The Sox begin their spring training schedule this week, with a game against Northeastern on Friday, followed by games against the Atlanta Braves on Saturday, and the Tampa Bay Rays on Sunday. It should be noted that spring training games will not take a break during the World Baseball Classic. Boston begins the regular season on March 30 against the Baltimore Orioles at Fenway Park.

The Houston Astros enter the 2023 MLB season as the favorite to win the World Series, at +600. The Los Angeles Dodgers have the second-best odds, at +750. The New York Yankees, New York Mets, and Atlanta Braves are all tied for the third-best odds, at +800. The Red Sox are in the middle of the pack, at +6,000. Follow Danny on instagram @ DannyPicard.