Bayport-Blue Point Claims First Long Island Title
The Phantoms can now call itself the Long Island Champions.
Bayport-Blue Point captured its first ever Long Island Championship on Saturday afternoon, edging Cold Spring Harbor 3-2 at Shoreham-Wading River High School in a rematch of the 2023 final.
“It feels so good, four years later and we finally got the Long Island Championship,” said senior Emilia Romano, referring to Bayport-Blue Point reaching the final each of the last four years. “I have spent my whole high school career with the team, and I really felt that this was our year. We beat the two [Suffolk County] Large School finalists during the season so I knew we could do it. We came here and did what we had to do.”
Romano helped lead the way for her team on Saturday by notching a 6-2, 6-1 victory in the first singles position.
Prior to that, Cold Spring Harbor jumped out to the early lead as Dylan Savarese & Kaitlynn Hanna posted a 6-3, 6-0 victory at first doubles.
“I think we strategized more today than we usually do,” said Hanna. “We practiced a lot of match play during the weeks off and were able to be aggressive at net today.”
With two matches in the books, the second double pairing of Stevie Sullivan & Sylvana Guariglia held on to win 6-2, 0-6, 6-1 to bring the Seahawks within one court of another Long Island title.
With two courts remaining, Bayport-Blue Point needed to rely on the third doubles team, the eighth-grade duo of Leila Rogers & Jordana Heller, and sophomore Lily Castka at second singles.
“There was quite a momentum shift there, and even though we were down, I was confident,” said Bayport-Blue Point head coach John Selvaggio. “The girls were playing with a lot of energy and a lot of enthusiasm. It’s a mental game. The records and UTRs can be overrated, you have to go out there and play. I knew there would be three-set battles, but I was confident in my girls.”
After falling down 1-0 in the third set, Heller & Rogers completed their comeback and posted a 3-6, 6-3, 6-3 victory to even up the overall match.
On the second singles court, Castka found herself down 0-3, and needed to reset herself as she knew the magnitude of the result of her match.
“I took a couple of deep breaths on that changeover, and told myself to just get every ball back into the court, and wait for my opportunity to put balls away, but not rush it,” said Castka. “I told myself to get one game and start from there. Once I was able to get that game, I could feel the momentum, and took it point-by-point.”
That approach proved to be successful, as Castka proceeded to rattle off the next six games from 0-3 down, winning her court and sealing her team’s first Long Island Championship.
“Their girl fought her tail off, and she was extremely consistent,” Selvaggio said of Kami Cotek, Castka’s second singles opponent. “Lily was able to overcome it, she’s our Division Champion for a reason, and that experience in big matches paid off.
It means everything to be able to win one for the former coach [Keith Scharf] who put 20 years into this program. We’re excited for this opportunity [to go to States], and are going to embrace the moment. These girls are creating memories for themselves right now, and win, lose or draw, we are going to enjoy it.”
The Phantoms will now head to the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center for the NYSPHSAA Team Championships on Friday, November 8.
“We’re really excited, we wanted this for a long time and have had opportunities,” said Castka. “I think this is the best team that we’ve had, and we’re ready.”
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