Oceanside advances to finals

It’s late May and they’re still playing baseball at Oceanside. Year in, year out, the Sailors prove to be among the elite teams in the county and is typically one of the last standing in Nassau Class AA. Yet, they haven’t been able to break through and capture a county championship since 2004.

After years of knocking on the door, is this the year that Oceanside kicks it in and earns county supremacy? After a sweep of Farmingdale in the best-of-three semifinals, the Sailors are two victories away from reaching their goal.

In the series clincher, junior Jake Lazzaro went 2-for-3 and knocked in the go-ahead run with a single in the top of the sixth inning to lead No. 1 Oceanside (21-2) to a 5-3 road victory over the sixth-seeded Dalers. With the win, the Sailors advanced to the AA finals and a date with perennial-power Massapequa.  Oceanside swept the three-game series with the Chiefs during the regular season.

Oceanside coach Mike Postilio believes his team needs to stick to the plan when it comes to its preparation for the championship round. “It’s really just continuing what we’ve been doing all season long,” Postilio said. “We’ve been in every type of game. We’ve had blowouts, games where we’ve had to come from behind, and others where we’ve just scratched and clawed throughout. The guys are resilient and play with a lot of confidence.”

After Brendan McFall (6-0) pitched the team to a 7-3 victory in the series opener, the Sailors had to come back from a 3-0 deficit in game two. The Dalers scored three in the bottom of the first inning, but Matt Carey, who improved to 8-0, shut them down the rest of the way. Oceanside scored a single run in five of the last six innings. Dylan Judd singled home the tying run in the top of the fifth inning.

The Sailors used all of the key components, timely hitting, good pitching, and tight defense to wrap up the series. They flashed some leather in the bottom of the seventh. First, center fielder Austin Vlahakis made a diving catch to take away a hit, and then left fielder Leo Alvarez went a long way to track down the final out. 

Massapequa, which lost five of seven games during a stretch of the regular season, enters the finals riding a 12-game winning streak. The Chiefs swept East Meadow and Plainview JFK to earn a trip to the championship round. A fitting opponent for the Sailors to meet to break their title drought.

“It should be a great matchup,” Postilio said. “They have an elite program. The two teams are very similar in terms of approach to the game. They’re a well-coached team and play the game the right way. We’ll look to do what we did to get here; have quality at-bats, hit in good counts, and hit the ball hard.”

The results of the Class AA championship series was unavailable at presstime.