Ward Melville outlasts Floyd in epic Suffolk I football final
TERRIFIC TRIO. Joe Benedetto, left, Joey Karpowicz and Hudson Philbrick are bringing the hardware back to Ward Melville. Credit: Michael A. Rupolo Sr.
Two great teams. Two different styles. One whale of a Suffolk Division I football championship game.
Holding a three-point lead and facing third-and-7 from its 35 with 2:40 left, Ward Melville dialed up one more pass. Hudson Philbrick took a hit and lofted a pass to the left sideline, where Joey Karpowicz jumped and came down in bounds with a 10-yard completion.
First down.
“I got knocked down pretty hard on that throw, so I looked up and saw the ref waving his hands that it was a catch,” Philbrick said. “I shot up and I was ecstatic.”
Two plays later, Joe Benedetto ran 10 yards for another first down to seal No. 2 Ward Melville’s 31-28 win over top-seeded Floyd on Friday night at Stony Brook University.
The Patriots claimed their fourth county title and first since 2022 and ended Floyd’s two-year reign as Suffolk Division I champs.
Floyd (10-1) defeated Ward Melville, 34-6, in last year’s final.
“Every single day at practice, we were thinking about last year’s county final against Floyd,” Benedetto said. “That [stunk] for every single one of us. We knew that feeling and there was no way we were feeling that again. On to the LIC we go.”
Ward Melville (10-1) will face Massapequa (11-0) in the Long Island Class I championship game at noon on Friday at Hofstra.
Philbrick was surgical in big moments all night.
He watched on the sideline as Floyd’s Ja’Quan Thomas led a 14-play, 80-yard drive that spanned 8:09. Thomas capped it with a 5-yard touchdown run that cut Floyd’s deficit to 24-21 with 9:41 left.
On the second play of Ward Melville’s ensuing drive, Philbrick uncorked a deep ball to Karpowicz for a 47-yard completion to Floyd’s 20-yard line.
“We needed the first down. We needed to score,” Philbrick said. “I put faith in Joey and I knew he was going to be open. I just had to make the right read and give him a half-decent ball and let him go to work.”
It was a perfectly placed ball, like most of Philbrick’s throws throughout the game.
“Every time I run a route, he throws it right where I want it to be,” Karpowicz said.
Benedetto’s 1-yard TD run gave the Patriots a 31-21 lead with 6:35 left.
Philbrick completed 12 of 18 passes for 230 yards and two touchdowns and ran for 43 yards on 10 carries.
“He’s a special kid,” coach Chris Boltrek said. “He started last year as a sophomore and kind of went through the growing pains. I figured he would take a step this year and he took a leap over a tall building.”
Benedetto had 19 carries for 98 yards and two touchdowns and three catches for 46 yards and a TD. Karpowicz caught six passes for 141 yards and a TD.
Thomas, a 6-2, 225-pound running back, took most of Floyd’s snaps out of the Wildcat formation, had 23 carries for 184 yards and three touchdowns and completed 6 of 7 passes for 143 yards and a TD.
With the Patriots focused heavily on stopping Floyd’s physical running game, Thomas had receivers open on the outside for explosive plays. He completed a 26-yard TD pass to Christian Hobson in the first quarter.
“Ja’Quan is an amazing athlete and an amazing kid,” Floyd coach Paul Longo said. “He certainly gave it his all. We tried something a little different, coming out in the Wildcat. I thought it worked pretty well.”
Ethan Jargo kicked a 30-yard field goal to give Ward Melville a 17-14 lead with 31 seconds left in the first half. Thomas answered with a 47-yard pass to Evan Commodore to set Floyd up for a 42-yard field goal as time expired in the half, but the ball hit the crossbar and bounced back into the end zone.
“I told them it was a great season,” Longo said. “We went 10-0 and we lost a game by three points, by three inches. If the ball was three inches further on the field goal, it would’ve bounced the other way. It was two great teams, and one team had to win.”
Matt Lindsay is a high school sports reporter who joined Newsday in 2022 after graduating from Stony Brook University.
