Mission compete: Hingham girls hockey wins Div. 1 state championship

AI-assisted summary
• The Hingham High School girls hockey team won the Division 1 state championship with a 5-2 victory over Bishop Stang.
• Senior captain Caroline Doherty led Hingham with a hat trick, scoring her 150th career goal in the process.
• Hingham goalie Izzy Puleo made several key saves and the team received strong support from the "Red Army" student section.
• Hingham, which finished the season with a 24-1-1 record, graduates four seniors but has a strong core of returning players.

BOSTON -- They didn’t come this far just to come this far. So when the final horn went off Sunday at the TD Garden, the Hingham girls hockey team had completed its masterpiece of a season with a Division 1 state championship.

After giving Bishop Stang an early 1-0 lead, the Harborwomen scored the next five goals and finished their story with a 5-2 state championship victory to cap an incredible 24-1-1 season.

“The three things we focused on throughout the whole playoff run were compete, discipline and composure. I think that really came into play here,” said Hingham head coach Courtney Turner. “Bishop Stang played well, but we’re a really deep team. At the end of the day I think that goes pretty far. They had an awesome run (in the tournament) and their goalie (freshman Vivienne Melo) played fantastic. We just stuck to our game plan.”

Hingham senior captain Caroline Doherty finished her historic career with another hat trick. She finished with 43 goals on the season and 152 in all for her high school career.

“Big players show up in big games. She just fulfilled her legacy here,” said Turner. “I think she really cemented it in the record books. It’s a full team effort, but obviously she had three goals and there’s four other people out on the ice with her.”

If you ask Doherty, there were more than four teammates on the ice with her. She also had the Red Army, Hingham’s boisterous student section, riding shotgun every step of the way.

“Having the Red Army here with us was unbelievable. Even before the game I was looking up in the stands and just getting chills. Hingham’s such a great community,” said Doherty.

Fellow senior captain Addy Garrity, who also scored a goal, echoed her teammate's statements.

“It was so fun looking up into the stands and seeing everyone from town there. They made the trip all the way into Boston on the day of the St. Patrick’s Day parade and we knew they were there supporting us,” said Garrity. “Seeing that sea of red in the stands was really cool and it showed how much the fans love to support the sports teams in Hingham.”

As for scoring her goal, Garrity said “it was an amazing feeling that I’m going to remember forever.”

Stang took an early lead in the game with a power play goal. Hingham goalie Izzi Puleo made the stop on the original shot but the rebound went straight to Bishop Stang's Isa Rioux to put the puck into the wide open net.

Hingham answered back and then some, scoring the next five goals. It started with a goal from in front by Hannah Lasch with 3:09 left in the opening period.

That’s when the Doherty took over. She scored in the first minute of the second period on a breakaway from sophomore Shea Richardson and then quickly followed that up with a rope from the slot on the power play.

The hats started flying with 4:17 left in the game with Doherty’s third goal of her final high school game. Garrity and Bishop Stang’s Ashley Smith scored late as Hingham finished off their title chase with the 5-2 win.

“Once you get the first goal, the nerves are out,” said Doherty. “The beginning was nerve wracking, but after our goal you could kind of take a deep breath and keep playing from there.”

Doherty, Garrity, captain Helen Concannon, and Kailee Walsh are the only seniors on the Hingham roster, so it’s up to Puleo, junior Izzy McGarr, Lasch and a ton of other talented players coming back to get the team back to the Garden.

“This is the best way to go out for Caroline and Addy- scoring a goal at the Garden. Kailee and Helen were real leaders and helped this program reach new heights. I’m really happy for the seniors right now with all of the work that they put into this year,” said Turner. “Maybe we’ll have a different identity next year, but the group that’s coming back really wanted this win.”

Talking about playing in the Garden for the first time, Puleo thoroughly enjoyed the experience and is already looking to book a return trip in 2026.

“It’s brighter in here (than Pilgrim Skating Arena). I liked that. And the banners were so cool,” she said. “We’ve played in the Garden (in a state title game). Now we have an idea of what it takes to get here. We have a lot of underclassmen on this team and we’re going to be hungry to get back again.”