Athlete Of The Week: Gavin O’Leary

BOURNE – Junior Gavin O’Leary and the Monomoy-Mashpee boys hockey team have had themselves a month.

As the Sharks clinched a Cape and Islands League title for the second year in a row (going undefeated in the Lighthouse Division), O’Leary filled game sheet after game sheet.

“As a team, we've been playing really well,” he said. “I think the boys really kind of started to group together, and we’ve started to kind of click.”

O’Leary’s heater coincided with a five-game winning streak for Monomoy-Mashpee (11-8, No. 15 in Division 4) that began Jan. 28 with a 4-3 overtime win against Dennis-Yarmouth/Cape Cod Tech/Cape Cod Academy on senior night. O’Leary, a left-handed defenseman, tallied three assists that night.

A game later, O’Leary racked a hat trick, pouring in three scores against Old Rochester in a 5-1 win. Against Nantucket on Feb. 11 in a 5-2 win to finish Monomoy-Mashpee’s undefeated year within the division, O’Leary added a goal and two assists.

“Beyond the fact that he's scoring a bunch of goals and getting a bunch of assists, he's as great defensively as he is offensively, so we can always rely on him,” head coach Chris Harlow said. “If he's the last guy, he's always making a good defensive play. Even if he's — what I like to call — lugging the mail and he's moving up ice, if he makes a mistake, he's always the first guy back, so having him on the ice is huge.”

Against Rockland last Saturday, O’Leary scored both the equalizer and the game-winner in a 3-2 overtime win for Monomoy-Mashpee’s fifth straight. He basically played the entire extra period. Harlow said O’Leary is a “huge part of our operation.”

“Having him on the roster just gives us an awful lot of confidence every time that we're on the ice,” Harlow said. “And I know that against some of the top teams in our league, being able to match him up against their top line and know that he's not only going to shut them down but also produce for us lets the guys who are a little bit deeper in our lineup thrive a little bit as well.”

On the defensive side of the rink, O’Leary clearly doesn’t shy away from physicality. Bringing that element of the game to the Sharks — instilling the notion in opponents that if they hold the puck a little too long, they’re going to get hit — has been crucial, according to Harlow.

“It's getting closer to playoff time,” O’Leary said. “Obviously, playoffs are more physical, so I'm just trying to bring that element now so when playoffs come, it’s no surprise.”