Michael Spinella, Seaford football stun Plainedge to win Nassau Conference IV final
Michael Spinella of Seaford throws a touchdown pass to Brian Hennessy during the Nassau Conference IV football final against Plainedge at Hofstra University on Friday.
Plainedge rolled over Seaford by 35 points when the teams met on the Red Devils’ field in the regular-season finale on Halloween. The Vikings couldn’t score on them.
Now the teams were having a rematch, playing Friday night football at Hofstra’s Shuart Stadium for the Nassau Conference IV championship.
But for anyone expecting more of the same, Seaford had a different game plan.
The second-seeded Vikings built a three-touchdown cushion at halftime and beat top-seeded and previously undefeated Plainedge, 21-7, for their second county title in three years.
They will try to earn their first Long Island Class IV championship since 2017 at 4:30 p.m. on Saturday at Stony Brook, facing Suffolk winner Bayport-Blue Point (9-2).
The sound of Seaford, county champ had a real nice ring to the 10-1 Vikings.
“It’s great,” senior quarterback Michael Spinella said after throwing for two touchdowns and all of his 165 yards in the first half. “It’s something that you dream of as a little kid, going out there and competing with your brothers and just getting a great win.
“Personally, I feel like I’ve been doubted my entire senior season, and I can list so many examples right now. But it’s just a testament to my work put it, a testament to the team’s work put it.”
This game not only was a stark contrast with what happened three weeks earlier but was a stark contrast with last year’s result. Plainedge ended the Vikings’ season in the semis on a Hail Mary.
“We talked about it in the offseason, in the weight room, and we put that to bed,” second-year coach Mike McHugh said. “We said, ‘This is a new team. This is a new destination. This is a new goal for us. If we’re going to win this, we put the ghosts behind us.’
“And that’s what we needed to do to beat this team. We just had to play our game with this special group of guys.”
Still, Brian Falk felt some satisfaction when it was over, flashing back to last year.
“They took that win from us,” said the standout senior running back/linebacker, who rushed 18 times for 50 yards. “So it’s just nice to take it back and win the whole thing.”
Seaford came out throwing this time after Falk was held to 26 yards rushing on Oct. 31.
“We had to,” McHugh said. “We knew they would target Falk.”
Spinella completed seven of his eight passes on the game’s opening drive, good for 52 yards.
The 12-play, 65-yard journey ended with a direct snap to Falk, who ran right for a 3-yard touchdown.
Spinella went long in the second quarter to senior receiver Brian Hennessy for a 45-yard touchdown.
Then it was second-and-10 for the Vikings at the Plainedge 25 with 2.7 seconds left in the half. Spinella threw to Hennessy in the left side of the end zone for the TD at 0:00 to make it 21-0.
“Their kids in the first half played a lot harder than our guys,” Red Devils coach Rob Shaver said.
Dylan Fella, who ran 21 times for 104 yards, got Plainedge on the board in the third quarter, carrying it in from the 1.
It looked as if Plainedge had scored again on a 24-yard pass from Jaxson Torres to Fella with 6:34 left, but Torres was flagged for being beyond the line of scrimmage.
“We looked at it on film,” Shaver said. “He was clearly behind the line.”
But the Vikings’ defense excelled overall.
“We stacked the box this time,” Falk said. “ . . . The guys just came to play. We wanted it more than them.”
So the Red Devils ended at 10-1.
“We have a high standard at Plainedge,” Shaver said. “Anything short of a Long Island championship is disappointing.”
McHugh’s first county championship as the man in charge meant a great deal to him. He passed a lot of credit to his 24 seniors.
“They came in as seniors and they believed,” McHugh said. “They believed in me; they believed in the coaching staff. And I believed in them.”
