12th Annual Christie Serino Baseball Classic Friday, April 24th in Malden

Tornado Baseball seeking to defend the title in Championship Final today at1:30 p.m.; Tournament played in memory of beloved late Saugus High, Malden Catholic Coach & AD Serino

Special to the Advocate

Christie “Chris” Serino is one of the most influential and revered coaches and mentors in the region’s history on the high school and college sports scene. He was a “larger than life” personality well-known throughout The Advocate readership communities of Everett, Malden, Revere and Saugus as a coach, athletic director and also as a three-sport star high school player in the late 1960s-early 1970s. He coached hockey at Saugus High, UNH, Merrimack College and Malden Catholic as well as baseball for many of his five sons’ teams through their growing years — he also was the former Baseball Head Coach at the University of New Hampshire. Coach Serino steered Saugus High to two boys hockey State Championships — its only state titles in any sports — as well as two Super 8 State Hockey Championships at Malden Catholic in 2011 and 2012.

Locally and across the region, many mourned his untimely passing in October 2012 from a battle with cancer while he was serving as athletic director and hockey Head Coach at Malden Catholic High School. He was only 62. In 2021, Coach Serino and his family received a tremendous honor when the new Football and Track Stadium at the newly built Saugus High School was dedicated in his honor.

On Friday, April 24 in Malden, for the 12th time, the late Coach Serino’s legacy will be honored again with the Championship Round of the playing of the 12th Annual Christie Serino Baseball Classic, where three teams will compete for the 2026 Championship. The Serino Classic originated in 2014 — first hosted by Saugus High School, Coach Serino’s alma mater — and has been held continuously since then, except for 2020, when it was sidelined along with the entire rest of the high school season.

On Friday the Malden High School Golden Tornado baseball squad will host a Doubleheader at Pine Banks Park in semifinal and finals action, beginning at 10:30 a.m. East Boston High School will play the Greater Lawrence Tech Reggies at 10:30 a.m. at Kezer Field at Pine Banks in one matchup. Malden High and Greater Lawrence will face off at 1:30 p.m. at Pine Banks in Game Two.

Malden High defeated East Boston, 16-4, on the road Friday, in a semifinal game. Freshman righthander Arthur Sewell made his varsity debut on the mound in the game, while sophomore Nick D’Anna pitched three scoreless innings to pick up his first pitching win. D’Anna also clubbed his first home run of the season (fourth of his career) and knocked a career single-game high five RBIs.

Malden High Baseball Head Coach Steve Freker said it has been an honor to memorialize Coach Serino all of these years. “He [Serino] was a leader and mentor to hundreds of athletes and coaches. There is really no one in this region who has made such an impact on so many lives in the high school and college ranks,” said Coach Freker, who is now in his 10th year at Malden High, his second time around as baseball head coach of his alma mater.

Freker previously coached at Malden High Baseball from 1985-1999. He was Baseball Head Coach at Malden Catholic from 2000-2012, all of the years Coach Serino was Athletic Director. From 2014-2016, Freker was Baseball Head Coach at Saugus High, before returning to Malden High for the 2017 season.

While at Malden Catholic, Freker served under Serino, who was athletic director at the time, and also coached two of Coach Serino’s sons, Nick and Anthony. Both of the sons were D-1 scholarship baseball players at UMass Amherst. Nick Serino went on to the professional ranks with the Toronto Blue Jays organization, one of eight professional MLB baseball players from Malden Catholic from 2003-2012.

“We started the Serino Classic in 2014 at Saugus High and it was such a big success we brought it to Malden High when we returned here,” Freker said.

Malden Mayor Gary Christenson has attended all the tournaments held in Malden since 2017 and was expected to deliver the first pitch today.

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SERINO CLASSIC

CHAMPIONSHIP HISTORY

Held in Saugus:

2014 — Saugus

2015— Saugus

2016 — Saugus

Held in Malden:

2017 — Malden HS

2018 — Malden HS

2019 — East Boston

2020 — No classic-COVID-19

2021 — Winthrop

2022 — East Boston

2023 — East Boston

2024 — Malden HS

2025 — Malden HS

2026 — ?