Playoff heartbreak for West Hempstead

Unfortunately, someone had to lose.

In one of the most exciting postseason soccer matches in recent history, New Hyde Park knocked off host West Hempstead to advance to semifinal round of the Nassau Class A girls’ soccer playoffs.

Savannah Campana scored the last penalty kick to give New Hyde Park the win. The score was tied 3-3 after regulation. Senior Kim Velazquez had 11 saves for the Rams.

Despite the heartbreaking loss, head coach Mike Scaturro was very proud of his team. “It was a tremendous game,” Scaturro said. “With a two-goal lead, I thought we had enough to finish it off. New Hyde Park has a terrific team. They battled back, and were flying all over the field. Nobody is at fault. We accomplished a lot this season, so the girls should feel very good about themselves.”

The scoreless first half was more of a feeling out process. Both defensive units did a terrific job on their own end of the field, and neither team had many opportunities to score. 

West Hempstead, the Conference VI champions, found the back of the net early in the second half when junior Olivia Czavar scored her fourth goal of the playoffs to give the Rams a 1-0 lead.

The Gladiators controlled play and has a bunch of scoring opportunities, but it was West Hempstead putting one between the posts. After some hard work from freshman Nina Borio, senior Ashley Merrill scored her first of the postseason to extend the lead to 2-0 in the 65th minute. 

What happened next was a blur. Just two minutes later, New Hyde Park’s Angelica Eranovic put the Gladiators right back in the game with her first playoff goal. New Hyde Park put on tremendous pressure, and quickly tied the score on a goal by sophomore Caroline Rodgers. 

The Gladiators weren’t done. With the Rams clearly on their heels, Rodgers banged one home, just four minutes later, to give New Hyde Park its first lead of the match.

West Hempstead didn’t quit. With time running down and the season on the line, Czavar continued her playoff magic by putting one past senior Christina Burkey with just over a minute remaining.

After neither team tallied during the four overtime periods, the game went to the penalty kick round. Czavar, Merrill, and Erin Guerrero all scored for West Hempstead, but Campana’s goal put an end to the Rams’ season.

Czavar, the Conference VI Player of the Year, and Velazquez both earned All-County recognition, Ashley Merrill and Katie Kurs picked up All-Classification honors, Guerrero, Ashley Centrella and Haylet Bifulco were named All-Conference performers, and April Slamowitz earned Senior Scholar-Athlete honors. 

Despite the fact West Hempstead, which finished 10-3-3, didn’t have a junior varsity program, Scaturro is optimistic about next season “We return a lot of talented players from a team that nearly advanced to the semifinals,” Scaturro said. “It’ll be tough replacing the goalkeeper, but we should be pretty good, next season.”