WINTHROP – These are heady days for Winthrop hoop fans.With both the boys and girls teams reaching their respective sectional finals, the Viking faithful will be in hoop heaven beginning tonight when the boys play North Cambridge Catholic in the Division 4 North final at Salem State College (7:45). On Saturday morning, it’s off to Lowell to see the girls play Pentucket in the Division 3 North final at the Tsongas Arena (10:45).Winthrop is the smallest school in the Northeastern Conference with only 580 students, but that hasn’t stopped the Vikings from taking it to much larger schools on a regular basis, particularly in football and oftentimes in hockey. In recent years, the Vikings have also been successful in softball and girls soccer.”This town is usually a hockey, football town,” Winthrop High boys basketball coach David Brown said. “This year, we have a good winter with both the boys and girls being successful.”One of the school’s biggest fans is its principal, Gail Conlon. Conlon lives in Lynn, but grew up in Winthrop and taught there for years before moving into administration.”There’s a lot of excitement at Winthrop High School right now. We have a lot of talented people and a lot of school spirit,” Conlon said, noting that the school is also in the state Drama Festival semifinals.The last few days have been a whirlwind of activity for both teams. The girls, their coaches and their families celebrated the win over Weston in the semifinals by going out to dinner at Su Chang’s in Peabody after the game.The boys and their coaches won’t be taking on North Cambridge Catholic on an empty stomach. Mike Eruzione, who sealed his fate as a hometown hero when he helped bring home the gold medal as a member of the 1980 US Olympic hockey team, treated the team to dinner at a local restaurant Thursday night.The boys had some work to do before the dinner bell sounded. Brown brought in a few hired guns to challenge his team at Thursday night’s practice. The team included Jasper Grassa from Lynn Classical, English’s Ryan Woumn, former Classical player Roberto Velon, and former Winthrop High players and brothers Jason and Anthony Griffin.”North Cambridge Catholic is a very athletic basketball team,” Brown said. “They play 10 or 11 guys. They put a lot of pressure on the ball. They push the ball in transition.”Brown is no stranger to tournament basketball. The 1989 St. Mary’s High graduate played in the North final 20 years ago. The Spartans ended up losing to Weston. Brown went on to play college basketball at Westfield State.”If we take care of the ball, we can stay in the game,” Brown said.Winthrop is the No. 5 seed and NCC is No. 6. The winner will play the winner of Avon-Cathedral in the state final at TD BankNorth Garden (there are no Division 4 teams in the Central or West).Winthrop girls coach Peter Grimes is expecting Pentucket to be tough. The Sachems defeated Swampscott, a team that beat Winthrop twice during the regular season, in the semifinals.”We’re pretty happy to have gone this far,” Grimes said. “We’re the only Northeastern Conference team still playing. For us, this probably will be a difficult challenge. We don’t have their size or their depth, but we do have our own people who are used to playing in tournament games over the years.”Grimes’ big guns, Courtney Finn, Kristen Finn, Nicole Giaquinto and Katerina Mallios, are all battle-tested. The fifth starter is a freshman, Johnna Fisher.Pentucket has plenty of weapons, one of them being junior 6-3 center Kirsten Daamen. Daamen can do a number on the opposition in the paint, prompting Grimes and his coaching staff to bring out the brooms at practice. The coaches stood there with their brooms, forcing the shooters to make a few adjustments.”You have to have some fun out there,” Grimes said.Grimes said his team is “having a blast” during the tournament run.”They’re having the time of their lives,” he said.When Grimes took over the program, the team was struggling. The Vik