The state flag football tournament hosted by the New York State Public High School Athletic Association is underway and the three Section 1 teams are still alive.
Check back here this week for scores from state regional games involving all three Section 1 champions, as well as the state final four and championships.
Here’s the schedule and the scoreboard.
Yorktown wins Class B state championship
The combination of quarterback Sophia Marcello and receiver Erin Duffy worked remarkably well for Yorktown’s flag football team.
Marcello and Duffy connected for three first-half touchdowns and the Huskers defense was its usual brand as Yorktown captured its first state championship with a 30-14 win over Section 3 champion Fayetteville-Manlius on June 7 at Homer High School.
The sophomore Marcello complimented the play of the freshman Duffy in key moments this weekend – the duo connected for three touchdowns in the semifinal too.
“Erin is a great receiver,” Marcello said. “She runs long routes amazing. I know I can throw to her.”
Duffy said she and Marcello connect on the field and also on the basketball court.
“Me and Soph are really close,” Duffy said. “We have that connection on and off the field. (The team) is super, super close. I’ve only been on the team a year and it feels like my whole life.”
Leading by two scores at 21-14, entering the fourth quarter, Yorktown got a touchdown run from Marcello and a sack and a safety from senior Sydney Soliz helped seal the deal for Yorktown.
“It has not even come close to being settled in yet,” Yorktown coach Mike Rescigno said. “There’s a lot of tears of joy and repeated hugs going on. When you work so hard and put your entire soul into something and it comes to fruition, it decompresses all of the air out of your chest.
“It was 7-6 at halftime today. That easily could have been a vibe that ended a game. Things weren’t perfect, but I pleaded with the team and told them that we didn’t get here by accident. I asked them to keep the faith and they absolutely always deliver.”
Soliz, a senior, teamed with junior Kayleigh Hung to anchor a defense that gave the rest of Section 1 fits for much of the season and now the rest of the state had to reckon with it.
“We all have confidence in each other that we will get the job done,” Soliz said. “It feels amazing to leave it on a good note.”
Rescigno coached the Yorktown tackle football team to a state championship berth in 2017, where the Huskers fell 14-6 to West Seneca. Did the coach ever see imagine himself as a state championship winning flag football coach?
“That’s a good question. Everyone asks me that,” Rescigno said. “The sport came out of nowhere and my principal (Joe DeGennaro) challenged me for the job.”
Rescigno also noted the encouragement of Yorktown athletic director Rob Barrett.
“I’ve never been more grateful for taking a leap of faith into this corner of the sports world,” Rescigno said. “We’re a legitimate program. I don’t look at it in any different light than any of my teams in tackle football.
“And I love Yorktown.”
Phil Strum is local sports editor for The Journal News/lohud.
Yorktown to play for Class B state title Sunday, Westlake falls in overtime in Class C semifinal
Yorktown’s flag football team will play for a Class B state championship Sunday, thanks to a 20-0 win over Long Island’s MacArthur on June 6 at Homer High School.
Yorktown will face Section 3 champion Fayetteville-Manlius at 3 p.m. Sunday, June 7, also at Homer.
In the win over MacArthur, Huskers quarterback Sophia Marcello had a trio of touchdown passes to Erin Duffy. Marcello threw for 121 yards and also had a pair of conversions. Corinne Negrelli and Chloe Quiles had six tackles apiece and Sydney Soliz had three sacks.
Westlake, on the other hand, lost a heartbreaker to Long Island’s Shoreham-Wading River in Saturday’s Class C state semifinal, falling 14-8 in overtime on a pick-six at Cortland High School.
Juliana DiMarino had 24 rushes for 179 yards with a touchdown for Westlake. Brianna McCallop led the defense with eight flag pulls.
Middletown edges Mamaroneck as first-year team falls 14-12 in state regional
GOSHEN — Mamaroneck’s inaugural season of flag football had to be considered a major success with a Section 1 title.
But, as coach Anthony Vitti explained following the Tigers’ 14-12 loss to Middletown in a Class A state regional final at Goshen High School, “This time of year, you get greedy. Ultimately, I wanted to keep coaching them.”
And he might have been doing that later this week if not for some untimely dropped passes, a couple of unsuccessful point after touchdown tries and for Middletown sophomore quarterback Ava Pryce, who made defender after defender miss with her ability to juke and spin away from trouble but who ultimately won the game on the strength of her arm.
What it means
Mamaroneck finished its season 12-5-1.
Middletown will play 11:30 a.m. Saturday at Cortland High School in a Class A state semifinal game against Section 11 champion Half Hollow Hills.
Turning point
A Margaret Insley interception led to Mamaroneck’s first score, which was in the first quarter. Quarterback Maddie Cashman ultimately took the ball in from a yard out but Middletown’s Analie Alvarez knocked down Cashman’s PAT pass attempt.
The score remained 6-0 entering the third quarter thanks largely to a great end zone pick by Middletown’s Jordyn Fluellen, who basically took the ball from the receiver’s hands with just seconds remaining in the second quarter.
That play would loom large.
Middletown forced Mamaroneck to turn the ball over on downs early in the third quarter.
Pryce then went to work. She connected on a couple of big passes, including a 23-yarder to Fluellen to the Tiger 14. After a couple of good defensive plays pushed the Bears back to the 19, Mamaroneck almost came up with a third defensive gem but the fast and incredibly elusive Pryce escaped being caught behind the line of scrimmage and then sent a perfect pass in the end zone to Jayden Ferguson for the TD. She hit Ferguson again moments later with a pass for the PAT to put Middletown up 7-6 with 1:51 left in the third quarter.
Five completions, a holding call against Middletown’s D and a first down run on fourth-and-three by the Tigers’ Sarah Sherman led to Cashman finding a streaking Soukey Tounkara over the middle for a five-yard TD score with 10:16 to play. But her PAT pass fell incomplete.
Less than two minutes later, the Bears turned that 12-7 deficit around with Pryce connecting on a 47-yard TD pass to Ferguson on a left-to-right crossing pattern. A PAT pass to Elani Blanco made it 14-12.
The Tigers got the ball twice before the time ran out but came up short with Middletown playing solid defense and Mamaroneck passes just missing or, on a couple of occasions, dropped.
Player of the game
Pryce was the best player on the field.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Vitti said of her play.
They said it
“We dropped the ball. (Other than that,) we competed on an even keel. But they made one more play than we did,” Vitti said.
“They’re hurting,” he said of his players, adding, “We’re all hurting.”
Yorktown routs Washingtonville to make state Class B semifinals
GOSHEN — Sophia Marcello ran for two touchdowns and passed for three more and Yorktown’s defense, viewed as its top asset, almost totally shut down Washingtonville in a 33-6 win Tuesday night in a state Class B regional flag football final at Goshen High School.
What it means
Yorktown will play Section 11’s MacArthur High School at 3 p.m. Saturday at Cortland High School in a state Class B semifinal game.
Turning point
Yorktown was in control from the start. A few plays after a nice punt return by Yorktown’s Olivia DelGaudio, Marcello hit Heilee Leonardo with a nine-yard scoring strike about three-and-a-half minutes into the game.
Before the quarter ended. Marcello put the ball in the perfect place — low — over well-covered freshman wide receiver Erin Duffy, who went down to get it for a five-yard TD — Duffy’s first of two TD receptions. (Duffy also had a pick.)
By the half, it was 27-0.
Player of the game
The sophomore Marcello, who’d run for touchdowns of one and four yards and who found Duffy again with a 20-yard TD pass, was the game’s top player.
They said it
“Confident is an understatement,” Yorktown coach Mike Rescigno said of his belief and his team’s belief in the Husker defense, which only yielded one touchdown — that on a 23-yard run by Washingtonville’s Lillyn Tietjen.
He noted Yorktown’s defensive strategy is to always have two players on the ball. That was one reason the Wizards tried some trickery with multiple laterals off single plays, although Yorktown was quick enough to shut that down.
“Our defense is amazing,” Marcello said. They have been all season. No matter who we put in, like they’re amazing,” Marcello said. “Our receivers catch everything and our coaches call really good plays.”
She added she thinks her team can “make it all the way.”
Westlake wins, headed to Class C final four
GOSHEN — She came in with a reputation for being smart, being elusive.
Then she just added to it.
Westlake’s sophomore quarterback, Juliana DiMarino, ran for three touchdowns and threw for another as Westlake defeated Section 9 Rhinebeck 26-20 Tuesday at Goshen High School in a state regional Class C final.
“Every play she has the ability to break it,” Westlake coach Lowell Robinson said of DiMarino, whose opening TD was a second quarter 77-yard run on the 80-yard field.
What it means
Westlake, 20-0, will play at 11:30 a.m. Saturday in a C state semifinal at Cortland High School against Section 11 champion Shoreham-Wading River.
Turning point
Rhinebeck didn’t seem out of the game until late, particularly because of Hawk QB Gwen Dampf’s ability to hit players in tight coverage across the middle and also to launch bombs down the field.
But Westlake gained all the momentum it would really need by scoring twice to go up 19-7 in the third quarter.
After a DiMarino 18-yard scramble, the QB found Mar Rivera Font in the left corner of the end zone for a two-yard TD pass.
Later in the quarter, DiMarino, looking to pass, instead saw an opening and scampered left for a seven-yard score.
While Rhinebeck kept fighting back (Dampf, for instance, had a 34-yard TD pass to Ella Romeo), it was always having to play catch-up with time not on its side.
Player of the game
DiMarino, whose eight-yard TD run put the game away with less than two minutes to play, took top game honors.
They said it
“Our coaches practiced us really hard for this game,” DiMarino said, calling Rhinebeck a “really tough team.”
“They were making their passes. They were sharp. They were good. They knew what they were doing. They have a good team. But knowing, I think, that we could do one step better, we wanted it more, I think that really helped us,” DiMarino said.
Robinson praised Dampf, saying, “She has a great arm and extended plays.”
But he’s clearly an even bigger fan of his own QB.
“She doesn’t get tired. She runs 70 yards and goes and plays D,” he said, grinning.
NYSPHSAA flag football championships
Class A
Subregionals
May 27
Union-Endicott 45, Scarsdale 21 – Reese Newman had a pair of touchdown passes to Leah Brown and Gia Asen, but the Raiders’ season ended at 15-4 with a loss to the Section 4 champion at Susquehanna Valley High School.
Penfield 26, Kenmore 12
Regional finals
May 29
Shaker 32, Syracuse East 7
May 30
Penfield 25, Union-Endicott 6
Half Hollow Hills East 27, Herricks 7
Tuesday, June 2
at Goshen High School
Middletown 14, Mamaroneck 12
State semifinals
Saturday, June 6
at Homer High School
Shaker 20, Penfield 13
Half Hollow Hills East 37, Middletown 18
State championship
Sunday, June 7
at Homer High School
Half Hollow Hills East 26, Shaker 14
Class B
Sub-regionals
Binghamton 39, Troy 6
Clarence 32, Webster Schroeder 13
Regional finals
May 29
Fayetteville-Manlius 26, Columbia 0
May 30
Clarence 19, Binghamton 0
MacArthur 25, Hauppauge 19
Tuesday, June 2
at Goshen High School
Yorktown 33, Washingtonville 6
State semifinals
at Homer High School
Fayetteville-Manlius 24, Clarence 14
Yorktown 20, MacArthur 0
State championship
at Homer High School
Yorktown 30, Fayetteville-Manlius 14
Class C
Sub-regionals
Susquehanna Valley7, Oneida 0
Pioneer 26, Bishop Kearney 0
Regional finals
May 30
Pioneer 20, Susquehanna Valley 0
Northeastern Clinton 7, Catskill 0
Shoreham-Wading River 46, Cold Spring Harbor 7
Tuesday, June 2
at Goshen High School
Westlake/Briarcliff 26, Rhinebeck 20
State semifinals
at Cortland High School
Pioneer 41, Northeastern Clinton 0
Shoreham-Wading River 14, Westlake 8, OT
State championship
at Homer High School
Pioneer 34, Shoreham-Wading River 6
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Yorktown wins state flag football championship, NYS scoreboard
Reporting by Phil Strum and Nancy Haggerty, Rockland/Westchester Journal News / Rockland/Westchester Journal News
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Phil Strum and Nancy Haggerty, Rockland/Westchester Journal News | USA TODAY Network
