Gowanda Small Town Times

[photo] Pictured is Gowanda Free Library director, Heidi Khawam, with the library’s 1st Place scarecrow, Spongebob Square Pants.

The end of September means the annual Scarecrow Contest in Gowanda. This very popular local event is one that both locals and former Gowanda residents look forward to. Voting was done on paper ballots over the weekend as well as online in the “You Know Your From Gowanda” group on Facebook, where likes for the photo of any scarecrow counts as a vote.

While the Gowanda Free Library has a new director this year, they still took 1st Place for the 2nd year in a row. The library entry, “Spongebob Square Pants” attracted 250 online votes towards a vote total of 250 including paper votes to gain the 2023 title of “Gowanda’s Favorite Scarecrow”. In 2nd Place was “Fisherman Floyd” created by Sue Trewer with a total of 192 votes. The top vote getter for a Gowanda business, and 3rd Place overall, went to Gowanda’s K&L Lanes for “Trixie Berger” with 131 votes.

While the number of entries has been modest in recent years, this year’s contest did attract an increased number of entries. In 2023 there were 8 scarecrows entered in the contest, up from 5 the previous year.

Michael and Barb Luffred of Gowanda celebrated their 64th wedding anniversary Sept. 26.

Football 3-2, 1-2

Friday, September 29

Wilson at Gowanda
- Homecoming -
Gowanda 30, Wilson 49

Girls Volleyball 8-2, 7-1

Monday, September 25

Silver Creek at Gowanda
- original scheduled for Sept. 14 -
Gowanda 3, Silver Creek 0
25-14/25-13/25-14

Tuesday, September 26

Gowanda at Salamanca
Gowanda 3, Salamanca 2
25-14/24-26/25-22/18-25/15-8

Wednesday, September 27

North Collins at Gowanda
Gowanda 3, North Collins 0
25-18/25-7/25-18

Cross Country

Tuesday, September 26

Gowanda at Salamanca
boys
1st CSP
2nd Gowanda
3rd Silver Creek/Forestville
Salamanca incomplete

girls
1st CSP
2nd Gowanda
Salamanca & Silver Creek/Forestville incomplete

Saturday, September 30

McQuaid Invitational [over 100 schools]
Varsity A-2 Small School results
boys Gowanda Top 3
Cashis Montour 67th 17:29.60
Jayson Twoguns 76th 17:35.00
Dustin Mohawk 169th 18:45.10

girls Gowanda Top 3
Calie Hudson 17th 19:22.40
Autumn Pupo 92nd 21:29.30
Alhanna Gabel 263rd 24:41.80

Boys Soccer 0-12, 0-6

Tuesday, September 26

Randolph at Pine Valley/Gowanda
Pine Valley 0, Randolph 8

Thursday, September 28

Pine Valley/Gowanda at Cassadaga Valley-Falconer
Pine Valley 0, Cassadaga Valley 8

Saturday, September 30

Pine Valley/Gowanda at Dunkirk
- non-league -
Pine Valley 0, Dunkirk 7

Girls Soccer 2-8-2, 2-5-2

Monday, September 25

Pine Valley/Gowanda at Ellicottville
Pine Valley 0, Ellicottville 8

Wednesday, September 27

Randolph at Pine Valley/Gowanda
Pine Valley 1, Randolph 2

Friday, September 29

Catt.-Little Valley at Pine Valley/Gowanda
Pine Valley 2, Cattaraugus 1

[photo] Pictured are the 2023 GCS Homecoming Court and Royalty along with their class affiliation (from left to right) Evan Fort (2024), Aubrie Heron (2024), Michael Horth (2024), Alivia Capozzi (2024), ‘King’ Aiden Ackley (2024) [in effigy], ‘Queen’ Ella Luther (2024), ‘Prince’ Chase Bolen (2025), ‘Princess’ Cadence Luther (2027), Kierra Moses (2025), Carter Capozzi (2026), Brair Bartlet (2026) and Kyan Austin (2027).

Spirit Week in Gowanda annually is the run-up to Homecoming. Highlight events include the annual Spirit Parade and the Homecoming Coronation ceremony. For 2023, Spirit Week took on a fairy tale theme. The week kicked off with a very unique event as a new scoreboard was installed at Hillis Field in Gowanda on Monday, September 25.

The Spirit Parade took place on Thursday, September 28 featuring a number of elaborate floats created by various classes and groups in the school. Prizes of $200.00 each are awarded for Most Creative, Best Entertainment, Best Craftmanship and Most Spirited. An Additional $300.00 award goes to the Grand Champion float with all of the above categories being considered. The 2023 winners included Class of 2026 (Creative), Class of 2024 (Entertainment, JV Volleyball (Spirited), Class of 2025 (Craftsmanship) and Class of 2027 (Grand Champion).

On Saturday, the last day of September, It was time for the Homecoming Dance. It was the first social event to be held on the newly high refinished school gym floor. Music for the dance was provided by ‘The Wedding Guys 716’ with DJ Mike also acting as MC for the coronation ceremony. Doing the crowning honors was Student Council member, Alaina Kazmarsic. Senior Class member was only present in effigy after being sidelined with a broken leg. That didn’t prevent him from being named Homecoming King. A complete listing of the Homecoming Court & Royalty is above with their photo.

[photo]Pictured is the new scoreboard installed at Gowanda’s Hillis Field on Monday, September 25. Designed for dual Football/Lacrosse use, shown is the test of the lacrosse functions.

Without a doubt the biggest Gowanda sports news on September 25 is the upgrade to the scoreboard at Hillis Field. Crews worked all day removing the old scoreboard and assembling the new one. One by one the five sections of the new scoreboard were put in place. Once assembled it was time to make the final wiring connections. A little after 5 PM it was time to test the new scoreboard. Using pre-programmed demos of both the football and lacrosse scorekeeping functions, a few final tweaks had everything ready to go.

Delayed a week from the original installation date, the scoreboard install happened to come on Monday of Gowanda Central School Spirit Week. The first “test run” of the scoreboard will come on Thursday the 28th when the Senior and Junior Class girls take the field for the annual Flag Football game directly following the Spirit Parade. Then, on Friday, the Gowanda Pine Valley Football Homecoming game will mark the first official game using the new scoreboard.

Shortly after all was done at Hillis Field, the Gowanda Varsity girls volleyball team was hosting Silver Creek. The game had originally been scheduled for September 14th. It was an easy win for Gowanda sweeping the match 3-0 with games of 25-14, 25-13 and 25-14. With things well in hand, all of the players on the Gowanda bench saw playing time in the game. Full statistics are listed below:

* Elizabeth Green 10 kills, 3 aces, 2 digs

* Corrina John 6 kills 1 ace, 2 digs

* Addison Kota 3 kills 4 aces, 4 digs

* Holland Browning 2 kills, 3 aces, 7 digs

* Aubrie Heron 2 kills, 2 aces

* Cheyanna Pasterneck 1 kill

* Lauren Kelly 1 kill

* Jillian Gernatt 23 assists, 3 digs

* Ella Luther 3 aces, 19 digs

* Tessa Kohn 4 digs

* Sydney Smith 3 digs

* Madilyn Pawlak 2 digs

In other sports news for the 25th, the Pine Valley/Gowanda girls soccer team was at Ellicottville. It was quite the opposite experience from what the volleyball team had. They were outscored 4-0 in both halves of the game losing 8-0. The Ellicottville goalkeeper only faced a single shot in the game while the Pine Valley net was getting barraged. Starting Pine Valley goalkeeper, Destiny Lindquist, was pulled 56 minutes into the game after making 20 stops on 26 shots on goal. Replacing her for the final 24 minutes of the game was Pine Valley’s leading scorer on the season, Sarah Kruszka. Kruszka faced 12 shots on goal making 10 saves.