Antonio Santoro considers himself just a “fair” bocce ball player and says others on his team at the Methuen Sons of Italy are better. Yet he and his teammates were second to none following a winter tournament that recently finished up. They went undefeated and were crowned champions.

“We’ve been playing together for about eight years and this was the first time we won 17 games in a row,” he said. “When we reached Week 12 and we continued to win I didn’t think we’d reach Week 17. You’re bound to lose but it just so happened that we went all the way. Around game 15 family members started showing up to cheer us one and on the day we won, we all hugged each other.”