Two-time defending champ Massapequa advances to Nassau Class A girls lacrosse final
Bridget Valentine #16 of Masspequa, left, gets pressured by Molly Gober #15 of Port Washington during the Nassau girls lacrosse Class A semifinals at Adelphi University on Wednesday, May 24, 2023. Credit: James Escher
The Massapequa girls lacrosse team was pleased to be leading at halftime, but the players knew they were capable of more. They also knew a three-goal lead with 25 minutes left likely wasn’t going to be enough to guarantee a victory. And it didn’t take Massapequa long to do something about that.
Top-seeded Massapequa scored five goals in the opening four minutes of the second half en route to its 16-8 victory over No. 4 Port Washington in the girls lacrosse Nassau Class A semifinals at Adelphi on Wednesday.
“We wanted to keep the intensity up,” said Bridget Valentine, who had three goals and two assists. “We didn’t let up, even though we were winning.”
Massapequa (9-5) advances to play the winner of No. 3 Farmingdale/No. 2 Syosset in the Nassau Class A final at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at Adelphi. Massapequa is looking to win its third straight county title.
Massapequa utilized a balanced scoring effort on Wednesday. Joely Caramelli had three goals and an assist, Allison Petrullo had two goals and three assists, Ashley Mellilo and Ellen Leisen each had two goals and an assist and Jessica Giller had a goal and two assists.
“From the start of the season, we knew where we wanted to go and we’ve been taking each game one at a time,” Giller said. “And today we did a great job and we got what we wanted and we’re just going to keep going from there.”
Natalie DeMeo had four goals and Sienna Fox had three assists for Port Washington (8-7).
Massapequa had six different goal scorers during its 7-1 run over the first 15 minutes of the second half to open a 14-5 lead with 10:33 left in the second half. Massapequa led 7-4 at halftime.
“We know Port Washington’s definitely a team that can gain momentum and we didn’t want that to happen,” Caramelli said. “We wanted that to happen to us so we all talked at halftime and we came out in the second half ready to go.”
Massapequa returned nine starters from last year’s Nassau Class A championship team, which lost the Long Island Class A championship in double-overtime. That leadership has been pivotal for Massapequa all season.
“It’s huge to have those seniors on the field talking to each other constantly during plays and then also when they have that second to regroup after a goal,” coach Erin Kollar said. “They’ve been playing together for such a long time that they know what to say to each other to lift each other up and make those adjustments.”
