Chartiers Valley High School unified bocce team has successful first season
The Chartiers Valley High School unified bocce team capped off its first season with a seventh-place finish at the statewide competition in Hershey last month.
Courtney Chiurazzi, the team’s coach and a teacher in the district’s middle school, had high praise for the students’ efforts.
“They’ve done an incredible job. I couldn’t be more proud of them. First year team making it all the way states, it’s great,” Chiurazzi said.
The unified indoor bocce league is sponsored by the Pennsylvania branch of the Special Olympics, which offers multiple interscholastic sports for special needs students.
Chiurazzi has fond memories of playing bocce with her grandfather, and was eager to get involved when she heard Chartiers Valley was joining the unified bocce league.
The students who joined had some knowledge of how bocce is played from gym class.
The rules are simple: Two teams of four try to get their bocce balls closest to a smaller ball, the pallino. Each teammate has one throw per round. One team starts by throwing the pallino, then each team gets a chance to throw a bocce ball. From there, the team who is the farthest from the pallino throws. At the end of each round, the winning team gets a point for each ball that is closer to the target than the opposing team’s closest ball.
Since the students play indoors, the balls are much softer than typical outdoor bocce balls.
Marko Orbovich, a senior at Chartiers Valley, was interested in playing bocce when he was younger, and saw the opportunity to join the new team.
“I decided to join because it seemed like a lot of fun,” Orbovich said. “I’ve had a great time. I can’t believe we made it this far.”
Kendal Astor, a junior, got involved with the bocce team while volunteering with the Best Buddies program. Best Buddies connects its volunteers with students who have developmental disabilities, similar to Big Brothers Big Sisters.
“I think it’s a great way to be involved,” Astor said. “I feel like I’ve seen everyone progress so well this year … They didn’t have much to do outside of school with their school friends. So I feel like this is a great way.”
The students traveled to Hershey March 23 for states. Chiurazzi said that their seventh place is out of more than 250 teams across Pennsylvania. She called their first season “nothing short of incredible.”
“If we lost every game, I would have been just as proud of the team, but it’s really incredible the progress that we’ve made,” Chiurazzi said.