HERALD NEWS ALL SCHOLASTICS BANQUET: Athletes honored and Bronson Arroyo sings

WESTPORT — Megan Salsinha and Cameron Rodgers made history at the third annual Herald News All Scholastics awards banquet on Tuesday at White’s of Westport.

One might make the argument for naming the field hockey Player of the Year hardware the Salsinha Plaque. With Tuesday's presentation, the recent Somerset Berkley Regional High School graduate has now won the award in all three years of its existence. In helping SBR to its first field hockey state title, Salsinha last fall scored 58 goals and assisted on 24 others. For her career, she had 98 goals and 54 assists.

A track and field sensation from Durfee High School, Rodgers became the Herald News All Scholastic banquet’s first athlete to be named Player of the Year twice in the same school year. The recent graduate earned the honor for indoor track and field and then outdoor track and field. This past spring he finished second in the state in the 400-meter hurdles and qualified for the national high school championships in the hurdles and high jump.

The complete Player of the Year list:

Football, Matthew Gacioch (Tiverton High School).

Girls’ soccer, Meredith Castro (Case High School).

Boys’ soccer, Javier Beltran (Durfee High School).

Girls’ volleyball, Nyah Young (Case High School).

Golf, Landon Begin (Diman Regional).

Cross country (girls), Jordan Ramos (Somerset Berkley Regional).

Cross country (boys), Aidan O’Malley (Bishop Stang).

Field hockey, Megan Salsinha (Somerset Berkley Regional).

Girls’ basketball, Catherine Yeargin (Bishop Stang).

Boys’ basketball, Cooper Creek (Bishop Connolly High School).

Ice hockey, Elizabeth LePage (Bishop Stang High School).

Girls' swimming and diving, Jaelin Jang (Durfee).

Boys' Swimming and diving, Dmitry Gauntt (Bishop Stang High School).

Girls' Indoor track and field, Barbara Silva (Durfee High School).

Boys' indoor track and field, Cameron Rodgers (Durfee High School).

Softball, Ali Feilhauer (Case High School).

Baseball, Curtis Perry (Durfee High School).

Boys' tennis, Josh Dore (Tiverton High School).

Girls' tennis, Sailor Nordstrom (Bishop Stang High School).

Girls' Track and field, Kathryn Sullivan (Somerset Berkley Regional)

Boys' Track and field, Cameron Rodgers (Durfee High School).

Lacrosse, Caleb Ikkela (Bishop Stang High School).

The announcement of the players of the year capped the banquet, which drew a crowd of about 400. Herald News all-scholastic selections from all three school seasons were honored, as were this newspaper's two Teams of the Year — Massachusetts D1 field hockey state champion Somerset Berkley Regional and Rhode Island Division IV football state champion Tiverton.

The keynote speaker was Bronson Arroyo, the former Boston Red Sox pitcher and member of Boston's 2004 reverse-the-curse World Series championship team.

A veteran of 16 seasons in Major League Baseball, the 6-foot-5 Arroyo first addressed the crowd, emphasizing how lessons like "Let your word mean something" and "Be on time," taught to him at an early age by his father, were crucial to him piecing together such a lengthy baseball career. He retired in 2017. Sensing his son had a gift for baseball that could conceivably pay for a college education, Arroyo's dad introduced him to weightlifting, also at an early age. Arroyo said that at age 8, he could dead lift 235 pounds.

A musician during his baseball playing days, Arroyo now has his own band, which will be performing this Friday at Mohegan Sun. Playing his trusty guitar, he treated The Herald News banquet crowd to three songs, borrowing from the Goo Goo Dolls, Oasis and The Lumineers.

The event’s presenting sponsors were Carl’s Collision and Fall River Municipal Credit Union. The sports sponsors were Carl’s Collision, K. Garcia Productions and Linex.

"Tonight marked another great year of honoring our Herald News All-Scholastics students and their families,” said Mark Olivieri, Herald News publisher and the event’s emcee. “Having Bronson Arroyo address and perform for the audience was a different twist for this year's event. We are lucky to have great sponsors like Fall River Municipal Credit Union and Carl's Collision Center, who make this event possible each year. Already thinking about how we can make 2020 even better."

Email Greg Sullivan at gsullivan@heraldnews.com. Follow him @GregSullivanHN.