Class of 2025 enshrined in PCHS Athletic Hall of Fame
GUILFORD — The sports history of Piscataquis Community High School continues to grow with the induction of a pair of athletes, a long-time coach, a long-time contributor and a regional championship golf team as the seventh class in the PCHS Athletic Hall of Fame.
The Class of 2025 was formally enshrined during a mid-afternoon ceremony in the gymnasium on Saturday, Sept. 13 as part of the school’s annual Homecoming festivities.
The PCHS Athletic Hall of Fame Class of 2024 is made up of athletes Dora Pullyard Clukey and Brian Gaw, coach Russell Tracy, contributor Lori Gilbert and the 1981 regional champion Pirate golf team.
HALL OF FAME INDUCTEES — Athletes Dora Pullyard Clukey and Brian Gaw, coach Russell Tracy, contributor Lori Gilbert and the 1981 golf team make up the PCHS Athletic Hall of Fame Class of 2025. The group was formally inducted during a ceremony on Sept. 13 in the gymnasium.
Trisha Moulton, a member of the 2019 hall of fame class, welcomed everyone sitting on chairs set up on the gym floor and those gathered on the bleachers and congratulated the new hall of farmers. “Our inductees include some standout athletes from the 1980s, a long-time coach and contributor,” she said.
Merle Gilbert, a 2024 hall of fame inductee, said his wife Lori is this year’s contributor honoree. He said this category recognizes “the people behind the scenes and this woman’s been behind the scenes for 30-plus years.”
Lori Gilbert has sold concessions, kept score at basketball and softball games at the high school and middle school and assisted sports programs in other ways.
Tyler Tracy, a 2003 PCHS graduate who now is the head coach of the Freeport High School boys basketball team, introduced his father Russell by saying the elder Tracy coached him throughout his youth and when Tyler Tracy was in middle school he knew that he too wanted to be a coach someday. He said he loved the discussions with his father on the care ride home after a game and at the dinner table.
Tyher Tracy learned “coaching wasn’t just in the gym and not just X’s and O’s but for each kid, how to get the most out of them.”
Collaboration, resilience, accountability and building confidence are all key components of Russell Tracy’s coaching. He had his players push their comfort levels, putting in not just the time but the work and seeing that outcomes are determined by how they respond to failure.
Russell Tracy, who today coaches in Greenville said he started coaching in SAD 4 in 1990. His relationships with students and watching them succeed has kept him going for three and half decades. Tracy also credited the coaches he has worked with over the years and his wife.
Paul Stearns, a 2019 hall of fame inductee, said when he met Gaw in the fall of 1977 he could tell the then sixth-grader was something special. In high school Gaw was a key player on the 1982 and 1983 PCHS soccer teams and led the Pirates in goals and assists as a senior.
Gaw also played golf, basketball and baseball and is “arguably one of the top two or three players in school history” on the diamond. Gaw has since taught and coached in the district for decades.
Gaw thanked Stearns, his mother and his late father Dave, who was part of the inaugural hall of fame class in 2018, and Tracy who he coached with for a number of years.
Long-time PCHS field hockey coach Donna Jordan — a 3-time hall of famer between her coaching career and two state championship teams who now has field hockey playing area named for her — said Pullyard Clukey was a 3-sport Pirate star on the field hockey, basketball and softball teams.
Jordan said Pullyard Clukey was more than a standout athlete but a fierce competitor who gave everything she had and truly loved the sports she played. Jordan said Pullyard Clukey made everyone around her better by the way she carried herself and truly had joy while on the field and court.
Pullyard Clukey said she always put in 110 percent and being inducted into the PCHS Athletic Hall of Fame shows that others recognized this trait.
Moulton said the 1981 Pirate golf team won the Penquis League title by 36 strokes and then the regional championship by 40 before placing ninth at the state competition.
The names of the 2025 hall of fame inductees will be added to those of the six prior classes on a board in the lobby. The hall of fame committee meets annually to consider nominations, and nomination forms are available at https://www.sad4.org/page/athletics.