By Hal Levy, Shore Line Newspapers
Special to MaxPreps.com
The winningest coach in Connecticut high school football history has decided to retire.
Bill Mignault, the only varsity football coach in Ledyard High School history, turned in his whistle and clipboard ending a 42-year career at Ledyard, plus five more at Waterford.
Mignault, 78, a graduate of Killingly High School and the University of Connecticut, where he played football and baseball, began his coaching career as an assistant at Norwich Free Academy. He became the head coach at Waterford in 1959 and remained there until 1963, when Ledyard opened.
The Colonels began playing varsity football in 1966 and Mignault was there for all 303 wins including the 2007 CIAC Class M state championship, a 21-14 win over Berlin in which his grandson, Marc – the Ledyard quarterback – caught the winning touchdown pass on a trick play.
In all, Mignault had a 321-130-5 record with four state championships and eight appearances in state title games. The state runner-up in wins is Ed McCarthy, the current coach at West Haven (280-91-10 at West Haven and St. Joseph-Trumbul), followed by Jerry McDougall, 265-126-8 at Trumbull before he retired in 1997. Al Pellegrinelli (Berlin, St. Paul-Bristol) was 247-103-13 from 1967 to 2003 and Earl Lavery (Fairfield Prep) was 230-54-8 until he retired in 2003.
Mignault also served a stint as the athletic director at Ledyard.
Mignault has coached his sons, Brian and Bill Jr., both of whom went on to become assistants at Ledyard and Brian later was the head coach at Norwich Free Academy.
Three Mignault grandsons, B.K., Patrick and Marc, also played. The day Mignault surpassed McDougall to become the winningest coach in the state, B.K. threw a touchdown pass to Patrick to help beat Sports Sciences.
No successor has been named.
Regan Stepping Away at Tolland
Also on the retirement front, Beth Regan, who won three CIAC state soccer championships at Tolland High, has retired.
Regan, who took a leave-of-absence from Tolland to begin the women’s program at Eastern Connecticut State University (1986-1991), compiled a high school record of 273-78-41 from 1981 to 1985 and 1992 to 2007, with state titles in 1983, 1984 and 1985 plus six North Central Connecticut Conference crowns.
Regan also coaches Unified Sports in soccer and is the chair of the Connecticut Girls’ Soccer Coaches Association chairperson for All-State and All-America selections. She also teaches social studies at the high school, a job she plans to retain.
Boys Basketball
Final voting in the New Haven Register’s media poll for boys basketball included Class LL champ Crosby-Waterbury first with Class LL runner-up Trinity Catholic-Stamford second. Then came Windsor, Class L titlist Maloney-Meriden (Windsor beat Maloney by 40 in the Central Connecticut Conference playoffs but did not get to the Class LL title game) and New London, which lost to Maloney in the Class L semifinals.
The second five included Warren Harding-Bridgeport, Class M champ Stratford, Wilbur Cross-New Haven, Notre Dame-West Haven and Class L runner-up Lyman Hall-Wallinford.
An early look at next year has Trinity Catholic as probably the best returning team, in part because of the talents of 6-foot-7 Tevin Baskin plus 6-5 rising sophomore Takari Smalls.
Windsor is loaded, as well, and Torrington will be tough because of 6-8 Jordan Williams. Lyman Hall returns 6-7 Jefferson Lora and Hillhouse-New Haven has at least three starters returning.
Meanwhile, Allan Chaney of New London has been selected as the state’s Gatorade Player of the Year.
The 6-8 Chaney, who will play next year at the University of Florida, averaged 26 points and 15.1 rebounds a game for the Whalers along with 4.1 blocks, 3.3 assists and two steals a game while shooting 73 percent from the free throw line and 63 percent from the floor.
Indoor Track & Field
Donn Cabral of Glastonbury and Anna Shields of Lewis Mills-Burlington made it a Connecticut clean sweep of the 5000-meter run at a pair of national indoor track meets recently.
Cabral won the boys’ 5000 at the 25th National Scholastic Indoor Track Meet at the Armory in New York City, covering the distance in 14:44.16, the fifth fastest time in meet history.
Running at the Nike Indoor Nationals at Prince George’s County Sportsplex in Maryland, Shields ran 17:38 to win the event for girls.
Weight-Lifting
Wolcott High School won the Connecticut state high school weight-lifting championship recently in a meet at New London High School.
Wolcott totaled 13,130 pounds to edge Bridgeport Central (12,775). Masuk-Monroe was third with 12,750; followed by Shelton, 12, 605; New London, 12,535; Southington, 12,415; Woodland Regional-Beacon Falls, 12,125; Bristol Eastern, 11,735; Newtown, 11,620; and Berlin, 11,595.
