Rockland Footballer Shines, Warriors Charge to Championship

The 'College Sports Notebook' is published each Friday. Please send items of interest—including local athletes competing at out-of-town colleges—to marcmaturo@aol.com.

--

Keith Davie of Nyack is serving his 17th season as the head men’s soccer coach at Nyack College.

He is the winningest soccer coach in the college’s history, having surpassed Ray Enello.

Davie, who doubles as the private, evangelical college’s athletic director, is also a two-time coach of the year choice, has won two Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference (CACC) titles, and made one appearance in the National Christian College Athletic Association (NCCAA) national tournament.

“But this,” Davie says, “is the biggest deal so far.”

The veteran coach is referencing Nyack College’s first-ever bid to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division II soccer championship.

The Warriors, 13-5 and sixth-seeded, travel to Southern New Hampshire University to take on third-seeded C.W. Post, the third seed,  in the first round of the 32-team national tournament.  Kick-off today (Nov. 11) is slated for 6 p.m. at Larkin Field in Manchester, NH.

The winner advances to meet Southern New Hampshire on Sunday at 1 p.m. The host Penmen are 17-3, and received a first-round bye.

Nyack College comes into its historic opener having earned its second CACC title in the last three years by beating Post University 1-0 in overtime on a goal by Josh Hacking of Stratford, NJ.

“We faced an outstanding team that definitely did not deserve to lose,” said Davie. “It’s extremely great to win this because so many people did not give us much of a shot.”

Coach Davie, mentioning the importance CACC Tournament MVP Felix Horn, a midfielder from Halle, Germany, feels that college-career shutout leader Adrain Ibanez is capable of taking the Warriors to the next level.

“He can be the difference,” Davie said, noting the team’s .930 goals-allowed-average.

The shutout victory was the 21st for Ibanez, a graduate student from Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was brilliant in the victory, making four saves, and thwarting several different crosses to keep a talented Post side at bay. Ibanez’s shutout total also ranks him first all-time in the annals of CACC history.

Horn, who led the Warriors with 11 goals this season, is complemented by all-tournament honorees Marco Likos, a junior midfielder from Leipzig, Germany; senior forward Gaven Penny of Dagenham, England; and junior midfielder Mikey Robinson, also of Dagenham, England.

“We have a solid back four, a great midfield, and a great goalie,” Davie said, in assessing the Warriors.

“Mikey, for example, has no stats, but he’s key to the entire defense,” the coach continued. “He’s the defensive link, and Felix is the offensive link. Robinson’s a ball-winner, with great anticipation … stops things before they even get to our back line.”

STAC advances to NCAA second round

They had lost to New York Institute of Technology in the season finale, 2-0, but it was an entirely different story, and outcome for the men’s soccer team at St. Thomas Aquinas College in their first-ever NCAA Division II championship appearance.

Dominating throughout, the fifth-seeded Spartans of Coach Graham Brown—who got into the playoffs with an at-large bid—turned the tables on the Bears, winning 4-1 on Thursday on the campus of Franklin Pierce University in Rindge, NH.

STAC (11-3-4) advances to the second round on Saturday, but must face the seemingly unbeatable host Ravens of Franklin Pierce, who received a first-round bye after going nearly perfect during the regular season at 19-0-1. The only blemish on the record is a 1-1 tie at home on Oct. 8 against New Haven.

The Spartans shocked East Coast Conference champion and fourth-seeded NYIT (14-4-2) behind two goals from senior midfielder Remington Lee of Hopewell Junction, and one each from junior midfielders Dan Davren of Pearl River, and Sean Reily of Monroe.           

The Spartans led 1-0 at halftime on the strength of Davren’s goal, assisted by sophomore midfielder Robert Stevens, an alum of Arlington High.

Davren took a through pass from Stevens off a turnover, dribbled to the right box, and scored into the lower left corner.

Joe Connolly, who, like Davren, is a graduate of Nanuet High, helped raise the lead to 3-0 in the second half, assisting on goals by Lee, and Reily.

Connolly sent a cross pass near the top of the box to set up Lee, who dribbled in and scored into the lower right corner, and then Reily converted a rebound of Connolly’s header.

Following a goal by Houpe Harvey that put NYIT on the board—and shattered goalie Andrew Tartara’s shutout bid--Lee closed the scoring, unassisted, for the 4-1 margin.

Coach Clinton leads the charge

Seasoned coach Joe Clinton, in his 20th year on the sideline as head basketball coach, is ramped up at Dominican College.

“When I’m not, it’s time to retire,” offers the Pearl River resident, whose Chargers were selected to finished second in the Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference (CACC), as voted on by the conference’s 13 head coaches in a preseason poll.

Dominican, which competes in the Pace University Tip-Off Classis this weekend in Pleasantville, garnered three first-place votes and returns four of five starters from last season, including guards, junior Leon Porter of Laurel, MD (14.6 points per game, 4.2 rebounds per game, 5.1 assists per game) and the 2010-11 CACC co-rookie of the year, Khaleev Ginyard of Brentwood (11.4 ppg). 

Junior forward Cory Quimby of Otisville is back after averaging 7.6 points, and senior Michael Calzonetti of Gloucester, NJ (5.2 ppg) also returns to the starting lineup.

Despite the huge loss of 6-foot-10 Almin Hodzic to graduation, Clinton is hopeful that the solid core of returning veterans, and some standout newcomers will avert anything like the slow start of a year ago. Last season the Chargers opened at 0-7, but turned the season around with an impressive 16-6 run to finish a still-respectable 16-13.

“Basically, what I want to do is get off to a better start,” Clinton, not surprisingly, offered. “Everybody’s back except one guy, but Nick Smith, 6-foot-7, has a lot of potential.”

Smith was an all-section selection at Middletown High School, and will get a good look tonight at 6 o’clock when Dominican meets Assumption at Pace’s Goldstein Fitness Center on Bedford Road in Pleasantville (Nyack meets the host Setters at 8 p.m.)

Saturday’s doubleheader at Pace opens at 6 p.m. with Nyack meeting Assumption, followed by Dominican’s game against the host at 8.

“Our expectations are to play well, get ready for conference play. These are all good teams, so it should help us,” noted Clinton.

The Chargers will be home Nov. 18-19 for its Tip-Off Tournament, playing Molloy College and St. Thomas Aquinas College, but doesn’t open CACC competition until Nov. 30 when it will host Caldwell College.

Besides Smith, the Chargers are also looking to forward DaVonne Dunlap, a player-of-the-year at Kingston High two years ago who sat out last season, but is now eligible.

“He’s very athletic, with good moves to the basket, and finishes well,” Clinton said of Dunlap, who was a third-team all-state pick as a schoolboy. “He’ll do well.”

Porter, a second-team all-CACC choice last season, and Ginyard help give Dominican strength at the guard positions.

“They’re tough, and if the big guys hold up their end, we’ll be even tougher,” continued Clinton, who was a 1,000-point scorer at Union College, and is a graduate of Albertus Magnus where he is in the school’s hall of fame.  “Smith is solid inside, and Quimby is tough, too.”

Time will tell just how tough.

Veni, vidi, Fede

Marist College junior defensive end Terrence Fede of Nyack was named Pioneer Football League (PFL) co-defensive player of the week for his performance in a 23-13 victory over Drake, in which he registered 11 total tackles, including three sacks and four stops for a loss of yardage.

The weekly honor was the first for Fede, who came back the following week with seven tackles as Marist routed visiting Valparaiso, 30-7, in Poughkeepsie.

On the season, Fede leads the Red Foxes with 14 tackles for losses, and eight and a half sacks. He is also second on the team with 59 total tackles. His sack total is the most by a Red Fox in the last eight seasons.

Marist (4-6 overall, 2-4 PFL) visits powerful league rival San Diego (7-2) on Saturday at 4 p.m.

The newest Owl

Former Pearl River High standout Luke Houston is one of six newcomers to the backcourt on the Southern Connecticut State University men’s basketball team that is coming off the third-best single-season turnaround in Division II (plus-10 wins).

The Owls, who went 12-15 and qualified for the Northeast-10 Conference tournament for the first time since 2003, are ranked eighth in preseason poll, as voted on by the league’s head coaches.

Houston, an all-state selection at Pearl River, where he was a team captain and the Rockland County player of the year as a senior, is an obvious asset to the Owls.

Said second-year head coach Michael Donnelly: “Luke is a very good basketball player with tremendous upside. He possesses a high basketball IQ, and really knows how to play the game. Offensively, Luke is a creative scorer and is one of the best perimeter shooters in our program. He is a good athlete with a great feel for the game.”

The Owls open in Bridgeport, CT this weekend, meeting Post University on Saturday at 4 p.m., and host Bridgeport University on Sunday, also at 4 p.m. The Owls will be in New Haven, CT on Wednesday night at 7:30 to meet Adelphi University.

The basketball team will host its second annual “Hoops for Hunger” clinic on Nov. 19 at Moore Field House in New Haven. The event will run from 10 a.m. to noon. Participants are asked to bring a donation of non-perishable food items that will be contributed to the Connecticut Food Bank. For more information, please contact assistant coach Mike Makubika at 203-982-6253

Special honor

Tappan Zee High alum Chris Holihan, a midfielder on the men’s soccer team, was one of eight senior student-athletes to be honored by Epsilon Sigma Pi, Manhattan College’s oldest college-wide honor society during the Fall Honors Convocation at the Chapel of De La Salle and His Brothers. 

Epsilon Sigma Pi was founded in 1933 “to serve as a medium of recognition for students whose scholastic achievements throughout the first three years of college study warrant recognition by the college and their fellow students.”

Only students who have compiled a cumulative GPA of 3.50 or higher, and not incurred any academic failures during their first six semesters at Manhattan are eligible for induction at the beginning of their senior year.  Others who achieve those standards during their senior year are inducted at the May Commencement.

Also honored from the Hudson Valley was Robert Kehoe of Katonah, golf/swimming.

Holihan, who started 18 games for the Jaspers, was also named to the MAAC all-tournament team, despite missing the championship match with a broken toe. The Jaspers’ magical run ended at Lake Buena Vista, FL, with a 3-1 loss to top-seeded Fairfield in the title game.

Red Dragons roll into Cortaca Jug game

Senior linebacker Bill Smith of Nanuet, a recent selection to the D3football.com national “Team of the Week,” paced the defense with 15 tackles and an interception as Cortland State crushed Brockport, 64-43, in a wild New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) contest at Brockport.

The combined 107 points are the most ever in a Cortland football game, eclipsing the mark of 98 points set in Cortland’s 56-42 win at Brockport in 2009. Cortland improved to 7-2, both overall and in the NJAC. Brockport is 2-7 overall and 2-6 in the league. Cortland, however, was eliminated from the title race as both Montclair St. and Kean won. Those two teams are each 7-1 with one week remaining, and play each other on Saturday.

In defeat, sophomore linebacker John O’Hagan of Pearl River led the Golden Eagles with 17 tackles, nine solo.  

Brockport wraps up the regular season with a home game at 1 p.m. on Saturday against Morrisville as the Golden Eagles celebrate senior day

Cortland ends the regular season on Saturday at noon when it visits Ithaca College in the annual Cortaca Jug game – one of the nation’s top small-school rivalries. The game is sold out, with a crowd of well above 10,000 expected (the facility record for Butterfield Stadium is 12,620 for a Cortland game in 2001; last year at Cortland, the crowd was listed at 10,300).

“It’s a little bit like the (Little) Brown Jug game,” said Smith, who played for Coach Rich Conklin at Nanuet and starred in several games against rival Pearl River. “But it’s a lot bigger; we usually draw between 10,000 and 12,000.”

Smith, who also played at fullback for the Golden Knights, is especially excited about his last shot at Ithaca.

“The first two times I played them we lost,” Smith recalled, instantly. “Last year we were down 17-3 (in the third quarter), and came back to win (20-17). I’m excited; this is my last chance to go 2-2 against them.”

This is the 53rd time that the Cortaca Jug is up for grabs, although the schools have met 69 times, with Ithaca ahead in the overall series 39-27-3. Ithaca, helped by sophomore running back Sal Sulla of Stony Point (3.7 yards a carry), holds a 34-18 edge in the Cortaca Jug game. The Jug was the brainchild of opposing team captains in 1959, and the scores of each game were subsequently engraved on the Jug. When room ran out to include another score, a second Jug was necessitated.

“There’s a lot of history there. I’m excited,” Smith said, noting that Ithaca’s 4-5 record is deceiving. “They always play us tough anyway, and they had a lot of tough losses.”

Smith again, was on the mark. Ithaca lost to Alfred 21-19  last week, was edged by St. John Fisher in overtime, 13-10, and also lost at Springfield, 38-33, and at Utica, 20-15. Ithaca’s biggest margin of defeat came in the second game of the season, 21-7 at Salisbury.

“We’re 7-2, and want to go 8-2. Maybe we can get an at-large bid to the NCAA playoffs,” Smith concluded.           

Mortarboard musings

• The Mount Ida College football team, anchored at center by veteran junior Matt Bonomolo of Pearl River, won its second straight Eastern Collegiate Football Conference (ECFC) title with a 28-12 victory over Galludet University in Newton, MA. Senior running back Johnrone Bunch of Meriden, CT, sometimes running behind Bonomolo’s blocks, rushed for two touchdowns and 160 yards to become the Mustangs’ all-time leader with 4,245 yards. The Mustangs (5-4 overall) pulled to within a tie for third in the conference standings with a league slate of 4-2. The Mustangs host their final regular-season game of the year against Castleton State College on Saturday on senior day with a noon kickoff.

• Guards Tre Beaman of Nyack and Mycal Felder of Nanuet, a graduate of Clarkstown South, will be in action on Nov. 17 when the Rockland Community College men’s basketball team hosts Ulster County CC. The Hawks also feature forward Griffen Sheridan of Orangeburg, a Tappan Zee alum. The RCC women’s team includes Nanuet grads Nikki Saponaro and Christine Brezovsky; Lana Gjonbalaj of Congers and Clarkstown South; and Melissa Loughhane of Pearl River. The women are set to visit Westchester CC in Valhalla today, and then head to Saranac tomorrow to compete at the Saints Classic, hosted by North Country CC.

• St. Thomas Aquinas College soccer midfielders Daniel Davren of Pearl River, and Remington Lee of Hopewell Junction were named first-team all-East Coast Conference after the Spartans finished the regular season at 10-3-4. Davren, an alum of Nanuet High, led the team in scoring for a second straight season with seven goals and eight assists for 22 points. Midfielder Sean Reily of Monroe and goalie Andrew Tartara of Bardonia were selected to the second team. Tartara, who starred at Albertus Magnus, chalked up 64 saves with five shutouts. Lee is the only all-conference player who will not be back next season.

• Sophomore defenseman Andrew Moscardelli of Pearl River and the Wentworth College hockey team meet Franklin Pierce tonight in Fitchburg, MA, in the first game of the Federal Union Credit Shootout at the Wallace Civic Center.
  Wentworth, which lost its season opener to Salem State, 4-3, at Boston, MA, is also in action on Saturday against the winner of tonight’s Fitchburg State-Southern New Hampshire match-up.

• Who knows what trick Pat Kivlehan of West Nyack will have up his sleeve when the Rutgers University football team takes on another service academy on Saturday against the Cadets of West Point (3-6) in a late afternoon game at Yankee Stadium. The Scarlet Knights (6-3 overall, 3-2 Big East) already own a 21-20 victory over the Midshipmen of Navy in a game in which Kivlehan, a senior defensive back, made a key interception off a deflected pass while lying on his back. Rutgers, in line for a bowl bid, seems to have a penchant for nail-biting victories. Last week the Scarlet Knights overcame a 14-point second-half deficit to overtake the University of San Francisco in overtime, 20-17. Saturday’s contest is set for 3:30 p.m. on the CBS Sports Network.

• Junior Shelby Greany of Suffern leads the Providence College women’s cross-country team into action on Saturday at the NCAA Regionals in Buffalo.

• Sophomore Keeley Bateman of Pearl River set the St. Thomas Aquinas College 6k record of 23:28 at the NCAA East Regional at Franklin Park in Boston, MA.  Bateman helped the Lady Spartans to a 14th-place finish, which is a program best at the NCAA DII level.  Freshman Joe Chegwidden of Hamburg, NJ, led the men’s team to 15th, crossing the line in 33:29.

• Purchase College senior midfielder Ashley Panepinto finished the season with nine goals and seven assists for the Panthers. The North Rockland alum is a likely candidate to be named to the all-Skyline Conference women’s soccer team.

• Former Tappan Zee standout Ryan Sheridan of Blauvelt is prepping for the Oswego State men’s basketball home opener on Nov. 18 at Max Ziel Gymnasium against NCAA qualifier Ithaca. Sheridan, a senior guard, averaged nearly eight points a game, with 56 assists and 38 steals, for the Lakers (24-5) last season.

• David Ballen of Airmont, a Suffern High graduate, and Clarkstown North graduate Paul Fields will be in Wilkes-Barre, PA, on Saturday to compete in the John Reese Wrestling Duals at Wilkes University. Ballen competes at 125 pounds at Oneonta State; Fields competes at Cortland State, which placed third in a 13-team field at the King’s College Monarch Invitational in Wilkes-Barre, PA. Fields, wrestling at 140 pounds, dropped two decisions at the Monarch Invitational.

• Jordan Baum of Suffern is a junior forward on the women’s hockey team at Cortland State. The Red Dragons (2-1-1) host Elmira College (1-1-0) this weekend with games on Saturday at 7 p.m., and on Sunday at 2 p.m.

• All-Centennial Conference first-team member Georgio Milligan returns to the backcourt for the basketball team at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancester, PA. Milligan, a Spring Valley resident who starred at Don Bosco Prep, was second in scoring last season for the Diplomats, averaging 13 points per game. He led the team in assists (152), blocks (45), and steals (73). The Diplomats meet Neumann University of Aston, PA, on Nov. 18 at 8 p.m. in the second game of the F&M Tip-off Tournament (Oneonta State meets Kean University at 6 p.m.)

• Nanuet High graduate Meghan Richards is a freshman forward on the women’s basketball team at Nyack College, which visits St. Thomas Aquinas College in Sparkill on Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. The men counterparts meet at 8 p.m.