A number of East Hampton High School teams, namely football, girls volleyball, boys volleyball, and girls swimming, made the postseason in addition to the county-champion boys soccer team, not to forget the strong showings of the tennis doubles duo of Daniella Dunphy and Gillian Neubert and cross-country runner Dana Cebulski who competed at the state level.

    If the boys soccer team defeated Jericho for the Long Island Class A championship yesterday, it will play in the state final in Middletown on Saturday. A Bonac boys soccer team has never been in a state final before. Moreover, Marina Preiss, as the result of winning the 50 and 100-yard freestyle races in the county meet this past weekend, in personal best times, is to compete in the state meet at Ithaca College this weekend. John McGeehan, her coach, said she’s seeded fifth in the 100 free and 12th in the 50.

    Both volleyball teams were strong contenders in the playoffs. The girls lost 3-0 to their nemesis, Elwood-John Glenn, in the county Class B final, though, according to the team’s coach, Kathy McGeehan, “Westhampton’s athletic director, who heads up the county’s volleyball committee, said the match seemed like a five-setter. . . . It was the best we’ve played against Glenn all season. They are the defending state champs, after all. We gave it everything we had, but Glenn was outstanding.”

    Melanie Mackin, one of three seniors (the others being Maria Montoya and Charlotte Wiltshire), “was at the top of her game. She had 14 kills in 35 attempts, 10 digs, and 15 service receptions.”

    The girls finished with a 13-3 overall record, with all of their losses coming against Glenn. “The good news,” said McGeehan, “is that Glenn’s getting younger and we’re getting older. Melanie, Maria, and Charlotte will be missed, but we’ll have a lot of juniors and sophomores coming back.”

    Likewise, Josh Brussell, who coaches East Hampton’s boys team, was proud of his charges, who, in avenging a first-round playoff loss to Sayville last year, upended the Golden Flashes in five before going at it hammer and tong at Eastport-South Manor the next day.

    “L.B. Lownes played out of his mind and Thomas [King] was his usual formidable self. We lost the first set 27-25 and the second 28-26. That ought to give you an idea. We wound up losing 3-0, but it could have gone either way.”

    Bonac’s boys finished at 6-7 over all (6-4 in divisional play). “We’re a very young team — we had five seniors, three of whom [King, Lownes, and Evan Larsen] started. So, we have very high hopes for the future,” Brussell said. “We’ll try to win the county championship next year.”

    The girls swept Bayport-Blue Point in a semifinal played here last Thursday. The team finished with 10 service aces. Katie Brierley, the sophomore libero, who recently was named as the national volleyball coaches association’s player of the week in New York State, had four of them, and Mackin had three.

    In addition, Mackin had 14 kills; Raya O’Neal had 12; Montoya and Wiltshire, five each, and Carley Seekamp had two. Moreover, O’Neal had 15 assists, and Lydia Budd had nine.

    Defensively, Brierley had 24 digs, Mackin 10, and Jenna and Lydia Budd, seven each.

    “We’re really focused,” said McGeehan, “which was nice to see considering that because of the hurricane we hadn’t had school for a week.”

    Going into the final, East Hampton was the third-ranked Class B girls team in the state, “though Glenn,” said McGeehan, with a smile, “is ranked number-one.”

    The coach added that Mackin had set a school record by playing in three county finals. McGeehan also said that Kim Valverde, her former honorable mention all-American libero, now at Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, Fla., was “the first player I’ve ever had who’ll be in a national Final Four.”

    Neubert and Dunphy, both juniors, sailed through the girls tennis season undefeated, after which they won the division title and finished second in the county tourney.

    After receiving a bye in the first round of the state tournament, they prevailed 7-3 in the tiebreaker of an eight-game pro set to advance to the third round, but “lost,” said Neubert, “to the girls we’d beaten in the county semis, the Hills West team, 8-6, after we’d gone up 5-2. I don’t know what their coach said to them at that point, but they were going for everything when we began playing again.”

    Dunphy and Neubert work out with one of the East Hampton Indoor Tennis Club’s pros, Dennis Ferrando, in the off-season.

    As for Cebulski, her coach, Diane O’Donnell, said, “Dana did well in the state meet, though not as well as she wanted. It was a hard race — a rolling course with a lot of turns and short but really steep downhills. She found herself running in the middle of packs, and she’s not used to that. Still, it was her second straight year running at the states, and she’s only a sophomore. She’s upbeat — she’s already set her sights on next year.”

    Cebulski received a berth in the state meet as the result of winning the team qualifier race in the division meet at Sunken Meadow. “She could have run in the championship race,” said O’Donnell, “but Kevin [Barry, the boys coach] and I believe in running as a team.”

    The team qualifier race was for teams with below .500 records. “She was lucky she ran so well,” said O’Donnell, “because the storm forced them to cancel the state qualifier race, which usually determines which girls go to the states.”

    Cebulski reportedly was hoping her brother, Adam, who leads the boys team here, would make the states too, “but he didn’t have a great race at the division meet,” said O’Donnell. “He needed one more race. . . .”

    Further on the cross-country front, Ashley West, a freshman at Susquehanna University in Pennsylvania, was recently named the Landmark Conference’s rookie of the year, in addition to being named first-team all-conference by virtue of her sixth-place finish in the conference championships.

    Last weekend, she placed 83rd among 346 competitors in the Division III Mideast Regionals at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pa.

    With summer prey species flung hither and yon by Hurricane Sandy and the subsequent northeaster, striped bass have been dining on crabs, at least that’s what dockside post mortems have been revealing.

    The usual bottom-feeding crab eaters seem to be making up for whatever lost time occurred during the height of Sandy. Blackfish fishing has been productive in recent days. As for stripers in these waning weeks of the season, gannets have been seen diving presumably into schools of herring, high on the striped bass menu this time of year, a promising sign.

    Point is, bass are still around, most small by all accounts, but with fish in the teens mixed in with bluefish, according to Fred Kalkstein, an organizer of the Montauk SurfMasters tournament for striped bass caught from the beach. Mike Cappola, a contender and former tournament winner, reported catching three teen-size fish on Saturday night.

    He also observed the “dusty” look of the water, most likely the result of the fine silt or clay licked from Montauk’s earthen bluffs during the back-to-back storms.

    According to Kalkstein, Atilla Ozturk, another SurfMasters contender, turned googin (fisherman klutz) on Sunday night while fishing on the north side of Montauk Point. Atilla said the water was beautiful, fishy. He was casting and failed to notice he’d lassoed the rod tip, a not-uncommon occurrence, when casting.

    After casting his lure to the wind with no takers for some time, he finally got “a strong bite,” but as usually happens with a looped rod tip, the fish broke off. In the old days, the scene would be acted out on stage at the tournament finale dinner. This year it will be held on Dec. 8 at Gurney’s Inn. Who knows, Ozturk might re-enact the scene if prompted.

    As though the storms left a curse behind, Sam Doughty, a veteran fisherman, was fishing the North Bar, again north of Montauk Point, with a good-luck plug he’d found on the beach, one on which he could always depend for a fish when other lures failed. He reported catching a bass he estimated to be in the 40-pound range — “a big whack,” according to Kalkstein’s version of the story.

The fish turned and came straight to shore. Doughty reeled and reeled to keep tension on the line, the fish turned again and popped it. An examination of the terminal end showed where the fish’s gill plate must have worked through the leader, and Doughy lost his good-luck plug. Two veteran casters, two victorious fish.

    Kathy Vegessi, shoreside support for the Lazy Bones party boat, reported “red hot” striped bass fishing on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday morning, and “with a lot of throwbacks of undersized fish.” Lazy Bones went fishing post-storm after its dock in front of Salivar’s and Swallow East restaurants was repaired.

    Blackfish angling continues to be productive, with the West Lake Marina reporting an exceptional fish being caught by Hugh Chancey off Block Island over the weekend. The big tautog weighed 13.35 pounds. West Lake also reported steady striped bass fishing from boats working the North Rips out to the Midway spot. Eels were doing the trick.

    A reminder that the state bow season for deer is now under way and will continue until Dec. 31. The shotgun season will run from Jan. 7 through 31, weekdays only. A three-day turkey hunt will begin on Saturday and run through Wednesday. The bag limit is one bird of either sex per day.

 Russell Drumm

After the storms, birds feasted on floating moon snails that had been pounded from their shells.”

October 22, 1987

    It was the Jamie Grubb and Walter Casiel show Saturday at LaSalle Military Academy’s fir-lined football field as the East Hampton High School quarterback and its wide receiver combined on three touchdown pass plays, of 15, 6, and 35 yards, to win the League Seven game 20-6.

    . . . Afterward, Ted Meyer, Bonac’s coach, said that Bill Barbour Jr., David DiSunno, Nick Algios, and Jason Menu, all linemen, had played solidly on defense and offense.

    Pat Bistrian, the junior number-one on the East Hampton-Pierson High School golf team, whose season ended this week, placed fourth, with a 77, in Friday’s Conference Four tournament played at Swan Lake Country Club in Manorville.

    The East Hampton-Pierson High School cross-country team clinched the League Seven title Tuesday by defeating Westhampton 19-42 at Sag Harbor’s Mashashimuet Park. The win capped an undefeated season for East Hampton-Pierson, at 6-0.

October 29, 1987

    The Bonackers went for it the first time they had the ball in Saturday’s high school football game here with Babylon: Jamie Grubb, the quarterback, pitched to Walter Casiel, the wide receiver, who, in turn, passed long for Anthony Miller, who had come out of the backfield. But the razzle-dazzler fizzled as a Babylon defender intercepted on his team’s 38-yard line.

    And so it went that afternoon as the East Hampton High School football team bowed to its tough League Six opponent, 27-0.

    . . . The last time an East Hampton team upended the Panthers was in 1982, by the score of 24-21.

    Several of the Montauk Rugby Club’s players, including Frank Bistrian, Keith and Kevin Bunce, and Mike Toohey, “the best scrum half in the New York area,” according to the club’s founder, Charlie Whitmore, were planning to try out yesterday for the all-Metropolitan side in New York City.

    David Brauer won the 14-mile Dock cycling race in Montauk on Sunday in 32 minutes and 5 seconds. . . . It was the fifth time that Brauer has won the race in six years.

November 5, 1987

    Among the 22,000 New York City marathoners Sunday were at least several local participants who came away with buoyed spirits, and bodies that apparently were not unduly affected by the rigorous 26.2-mile ordeal.

    “It was like being in the Super Bowl,” said Tim Fitzpatrick, 26, who finished 918th, in 2 hours, 58 minutes, and 16 seconds.

    . . . It was the first marathon for Fitzpatrick, who only began running competitively a little more than a year ago. Though he had never raced farther than 6.2 miles, he nevertheless set out to break three hours. “I thought he was out of his mind,” said Johanna Pfund, 32, of Montauk, who did a cartwheel at the finish line.

    . . . “After doing something like this you know you can do whatever it is you want to do,” said Fitzpatrick.

Friday, November 16

GIRLS SWIMMING, state meet, Ithaca College, also Saturday.

Saturday, November 17

BOYS SOCCER, state Class A final, Middletown High School, Middletown, time to be announced.

Thursday, November 22

RUNNING,  3 and 6-mile Turkey Trot races around Fort Pond, co-sponsored by the East Hampton Town Parks and Recreation Department and Keeshan Realty, The Circle, Montauk, 10 and 10:10 a.m., registration from 8 to 9:30.

   When a visitor to Jeff and Melissa Eames’s house in Springs the other day noted that no other competitors could be seen in the photos of their 12-year-old champion Quad-racing daughter, Davis, they had to acknowledge that that was because Davis, who’s been riding A.T.V.s since she was 4 and racing them since the age of 6, invariably left her peers in the dust.

    “She won all three New England A.T.V. championships this past season,” said Jeff Eames. “In the 70 c.c., 90 c.c., and 90 Mod classes. That was her goal. Last year, she won the 90 C.V.T. and 90 Mod championships, but no one has ever won three championships in one season before. Actually, I didn’t even think it was possible.”

    The justifiably proud father and his slim 5-foot-2-inch, red-haired daughter had been clearing driveways earlier that morning, and sawdust clung to Davis’s jeans and Dustin Wimmer hoodie as she splayed out on one of the living room couches, alternately playing with the family’s lively little dogs, Chase and Fudge, with Hurricane, the abandoned kitten she’d rescued at the Hurricane Hills MX track in Clifford, Pa., and her yellow lizard, GMX, who, she said, had only bitten her once, when she had first picked her up at Pet Hampton. “She likes to eat crickets . . . she peed on my friend Kai, twice.”

    Asked for a highlight from the season just past, Jeff began, “At her last race, at Hurricane Hills, the national 90 Mod, 90 C.V.T., and 70 C.V.T. champions, whose season had ended a month earlier, entered the New England A.T.V. race with Davis.”

    “Yeah,” he said, in reply to a question, “they were all boys. Two were older than Davis and one was younger. Before the race began, they were playing mind games, talking trash, you could say, and I could see it was getting to her; she was wound up. Her coach, Dustin Wimmer, who was the national pro champ in ’08 and ’09 and was a top-level rider for Team Suzuki, told her simply to race her race.”

    “The stars must have been aligned,” Davis’s father continued. “She was second in the hole shot, behind one of the national champs, right on his butt. They went back and forth in the first lap, and in the second she took over and led the rest of the way. She’s got the heart of a lion.”

    “Later, the father of one of the national champs gave her full credit — there was no animosity — and asked why she didn’t race the national circuit. I said why bother traveling all over the country when we knew, based on what we’d just seen, how she would do.”

    While that story attested to his elder daughter’s grit, as did the fact that she had to be carried to the family’s R.V. utterly exhausted after racing 12 laps in 100-plus-degree heat at the New Jersey Raceway Park, the following spoke to her heart:

    “We were at Twister Valley in Fort Plain, N.Y., and Davis had torched everyone in the 70, 90, and 90 Mod races the first day. But all of us could see the track would be nothing but mud the next day because of heavy rains. No one wanted to muddy their bikes. We all agreed not to race.”

    “The next morning, one boy showed up at the line, on a spotless 90 C.V.T. Davis saw him and asked if she could give him the first-place trophy. We all said sure, and she walked up to him and, holding out the trophy, said, ‘Now you don’t have to get your bike all muddy.’ She became his hero with that gesture. She has so many trophies [upstairs, downstairs, and in the family’s garage] of her own. It shows her heart.”

    Davis and her younger sister, Devyn, who, on emerging from beneath a box she was playing in, said brightly, when a visitor asked how old she was, “Devyn’s 7!” are students at the Hayground School in Bridgehampton. Davis, who’s in the older group — Hayground’s eldest students are 13 — has, as part of her studies, been apprenticing with Nadia Ernestus, “the Hamptons Health Coach,” and, under the 537 Productions banner (537 is her racing number) has made several short films with her, “Hug a Farmer,” which is on the “Davis DareDevil” YouTube channel, being one.

    Her interests, she said, in answer to a question, were varied enough to keep her happy during the off-season. David Lys of Weekend Warriors, a fellow Springs resident, is her trainer, though she too has come up with conditioning ideas on her own. Asked if she wanted to become a pro — she looks up to Dustin Wimmer, who’s 25, as an older brother — Davis said, “Unh huh,” as if there were no need to ask.

    Did she play other sports? No, she said, because she didn’t want to get hurt. In her six-year career, she’s only flipped once, and once she hurt her thumb.

    “Next year, she’s moving up to the 300s,” said Davis’s father, who’s her chief mechanic. “We’re taking the engine from a C.F.R. 250 Honda dirt bike and putting it into a Quad. It should be ready by Jan. 14. So, beginning in April, she’ll be racing in the 90 Mod and 300 classes. She’ll be too old for the 70s. We might go to a national race in Georgia in March just to see how she does. . . . She’ll have plenty of competition in the 300s. I’ve told her to take it easy, at least in the first half of the season, but she said to me, ‘Dad, I’m not taking it easy!’ ”

    “I’ve told them [her fellow motocross competitors], ‘Watch out — I’m coming!’ ” said Davis as, with one foot on the ground, she revved up the 250, which her father had rolled out from the garage, and sped off across the front yard.

   Tortorella Pools as of Oct. 24 — no games were played Oct. 31 because of hurricane outages — led the East Hampton Wednesday evening 7-on-7 men’s soccer league going into this week’s matchups.

    Maidstone Market, which won its ninth straight playoff championship in August by defeating Tortorella 3-1 in the final, came into the week in second place, with a 4-2 record. Tortorella was 5-0-1.

    In a rematch of the 2012 spring final on Sept. 26, Tortorella handed the Market a 3-1 defeat. In his Web site report of that game, Leslie Czeladko said Maidstone had outplayed his team in the first half, although it was Tortorella that scored first, the result of a penalty kick awarded after Alex Meza, Maidstone’s keeper, had fouled Oscar Reinoso in the box. Meza drew a yellow card from the referee, Alex Ramirez, on the play, and was sent to the sidelines for two minutes, leaving his replacement, Carlos Torres, to defend against the penalty kick, which was taken by Eddie Lopez. Lopez buried the shot, treating his team, which had largely been on the defensive in the early going, to a 1-0 lead.

    Cesar Correa tied it at 1-1 for Maidstone before the half was over, converting a cross from Antonio Padilla, who had taken the ball to the endline. Tortorella’s goalie, Craig Caiazca, “made several great saves in the first half,” according to Czeladko, and that was the sole goal that he was to allow that night.

    It was Tortorella that did the attacking in the second frame. Juan Olvera set up his team’s second goal, racing with the ball down a sideline before sending a high cross toward the far post. Daniel Salazar couldn’t quite catch up with it, but Rodolfo Marin, a defender who had been trailing the play, did for a 2-1 Tortorella lead.

    Meza, who plays aggressively, soon after found himself out of position as he and Salazar leapt for a high-bounding ball that eluded both of them and wound up on the feet of Marin. Marin fed Salazar, who, after beating two defenders, capped the scoring as he drilled a shot into Maidstone’s nets.

    Adding insult to injury, the Market was edged 1-0 by F.C. Tuxpan, the league’s fifth-place team, on Oct. 24. It was do-or-die for Tuxpan, whose first win it was.

    Czeladko said, “It looked as if the match would end in a draw, but Tuxpan’s Luis Rivera scored on a counter attack that ended with the ball making its way from Rivera to Alberto Larios back to Rivera, whose chip shot beat the onrushing Alex Meza from about three yards out.”

    Maidstone wound up playing a man down when Cesar Correa was ejected by Ramirez following a foul in Tuxpan’s box and a profane protest.

    Tortorella also lost that night, by a score of 1-0 to Bateman Painting, the fourth-place team.

    Czeladko said: “From the start, both sides were attacking well, but Tortorella had a hard time moving the ball by Bateman’s defenders.”

    “Bateman had a chance to score when Jon Lizano stole the ball from Cristian Munoz, but Munoz shot over the crossbar from about 10 yards out.”

    “Bateman had another chance when it was awarded a direct kick near the box. Juan Zuluaga, facing a ‘wall’ of defenders, kicked wide of them to the right, the ball caroming to the left off a Tortorella defender, David Rodriguez. Caiazca, Tortorella’s keeper, punched the ball back to the right where a defender cleared it — a pinball skirmish that ruined a great chance for Bateman.”

    “It was looking as if the match would end up in a draw, but toward the end of regulation, Bateman’s Julian Munoz got the ball near midfield, raced with it into the goalie box and, from five yards out, fired a shot that beat Caiazca into the far corner.”

    Going into this week, there were 12 games left to play — last night, Monday, and Nov. 19 and 21 — before the playoff semifinals on Nov. 26 and the championship game on Nov. 28.

    In the “Golden Boot” competition, Maidstone’s Gehider Garcia led as of earlier this week with 6 goals and 1 assist. Tortorella’s Eddie Lopez was second, with 4 goals and 2 assists. Cesar Galea of 75 Main, Mario Olaya of Maidstone, and Oscar Reinoso of Tortorella, each had 3 goals. Maidstone’s Andy Gonzales had 2.

    About 10 years ago, Leif Hope, the Artists-Writers Softball Game’s impresario, had the idea for an exhibition at Guild Hall of the works of the myriad artists and writers who had played in this annual agon over the years.

    “At first, I was offered a back room,” said Hope during a conversation Monday. “Now, they’re giving us the main gallery, and the show will run from June 15 to July 27.”

    Hope had more or less given up on the idea when Sherrye Henry, who for 17 years had a WOR talk show, Deb McEneaney, and Walter Bernard picked up the ball and ran with it. “Elena Prohaska is also working on this,” said Hope, who added that he is reasonably sure the $25,000 to $40,000 needed to underwrite the show can be raised.

    “We’re going to try to exhibit the artwork and books of as many of those who’ve played in The Game as we can,” he said.

    The list is long, very long, and harks back to The Game’s origins some 60-plus years ago when it was contested by such art world luminaries as Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, and Franz Kline in the front yard of the sculptor Wilfrid Zogbaum’s house in Springs.

   Of those early days, Philip Pavia, a slugging sculptor to whom the first disguised grapefruit was served up by Kline, once said, “We played like the Brooklyn Dodgers. You know, a runner on first and second and somebody hits a home run and passes the ones ahead of him. Girls played, lots of them, but they didn’t care. They ran backwards sometimes. It was the start of the feminist movement!”

   “At first, my idea was to feature the works of all the artists who’ve played, but then I thought I should include the writers too,” said Hope. “They’re the ones after all who have all the celebrity: Kurt Vonnegut, John Irving, Irwin Shaw, George Plimpton, Willie Morris, Jay McInerney, Walter Isaacson, Peter Maas, Avery Corman, Wilfrid Sheed, Richard Reeves . . . people like that.”

   The artists whose works may be displayed — aside from the above-named — presumably include Esteban Vicente, Jimmy Ernst, Eric Ernst, Syd Solomon, Joan Mitchell, Herman Cherry, John Alexander, Paul Davis, Dan Christensen, Elwood Howell, Randy Rosenthal, Billy Hofmann, and Hope himself.

   It is no surprise that Davis Eames, the 12-year-old champion A.T.V. rider, and Julie Baum’s 7-year-old son, Liam, who suffers from an aggressive form of epilepsy, have teamed up, Baum said during a telephone conversation Monday.

    “Each of them has an ability to touch other people’s hearts — they’re empathic,” Baum said. “They have the gift of bringing people together. Neither of them puts anyone down — they see through differences. This gift is not common. If it were, the world would be a far better place.”

    Liam, “the Mayor of Springs School,” according to his mother, suffered a tonic-clonic [formerly grand mal] seizure at the Eameses’ house on a play date a while ago, an experience that profoundly affected Davis, who has dedicated her young racing career to finding a cure for the disease Liam suffers from, Dravet’s Syndrome.

    At all of her races henceforth, she’ll ask the attendees to make contributions to the Dravet Syndrome Foundation, and plans to sell some of her myriad trophies so that she can donate to the foundation as well.

    “It’s a genetic mutation epilepsy,” said Baum. “He’s had it since he was 5 months old, and yet, while a seizure can occur at any time, he plays baseball and basketball. . . . He’s said to me, ‘Mom, I have to keep trying.’ ”

    “We’ve been having some success with a drug from France, Stiripentol,” she continued. “The disease is tricky, very tenacious, and it can be catastrophic. There’s always a chance he can have a seizure, but the kid keeps on going! He’s one of the sweetest kids. No wonder he and Davis, who’s so engaged in life, and who sees in Liam all of his potential, connected.”

    Melissa Eames, Davis’s mother, said this week that donations to the Dravet Syndrome Foundation can be made in Davis’s name at DavisAgainstDravet. com.v

Thursday, November 8

BOYS SOCCER, first round county Class A tournament, Miller Place at East Hampton, 2 p.m.

BOYS VOLLEYBALL, first round Division II tournament, East Hampton at Sayville, 5 p.m.

Friday, November 9

BOYS SOCCER, county Class A semifinal, Eastport-Shoreham winner vs. East Hampton-Miller Place winner, site of higher seed, 2 p.m.

GIRLS VOLLEYBALL, county Class B championship game, site of higher seed, 4 p.m.

Saturday, November 10

FOOTBALL, first round Division IV playoffs, East Hampton at Babylon, 1 p.m.

GIRLS SWIMMING, East Hampton at county meet, Suffolk Community College-Brentwood, 2 p.m.

Sunday, November 11

BOYS SOCCER, county Class A championship game, Dowling College, 5 p.m.

   “We were playing for our lives,” Pete Vaziri said in the euphoric aftermath of Friday’s beatific 33-14 victory under the lights at McGann-Mercy in Riverhead.

    Indeed, Friday’s high school football game was a must-win for the Bonackers, who, as a result, nailed down Division IV’s last (eighth) playoff spot. That means they’ll be playing in the first round at top-seeded Babylon, which crushed them 44-7 in the season opener on Sept. 7, but Babylon (a traditional thorn in East Hampton’s side) can wait.

    First, a few thousand words about the above-mentioned blessed event.

    Mercy’s opening kickoff was taken by Johnny Pizzo to East Hampton’s 35-yardline, after which Cort Heneveld, the triple-option quarterback, darted to Mercy’s 25. Handoffs to Andre Cherrington and Danny Barros yielded a first-and-goal inside the 10. Cherrington then rushed to the 5, after which Heneveld emerged from a fierce scrum into the end zone.

    Max Lerner’s subsequent kickoff went deep, and the defense forced the home team to punt from its 24. The Bonackers took over at their 47, and 10 plays later, thanks to Cherrington’s 4-yard blast up the middle, was in the Riverhead Catholic school’s end zone again.

    “I think maybe they took us a little too lightly,” Cid Cerchiai, a longtime volunteer assistant, said, with a broad smile.

    Five touchdowns later, Bill Barbour Sr., the head coach’s father, said, “What we told the kids this week is that Mercy [which went in at 6-1 in contrast to East Hampton’s 2-5], aside from Shoreham, really hadn’t played anybody, while we had played a much tougher schedule than they had, and, aside from Babylon, we’d been in every game we’d played. Plus, Mercy had already clinched a playoff spot.”

    The Monarchs got one back early in the second quarter, Tom Kent’s score from the 1 capping a 76-yard drive during which he did virtually all of the ball-carrying.

    Mercy’s kickoff went out of bounds, enabling the Bonackers to take over at their 35, and in the blink of an eye Heneveld took off again, outsprinting Mercy’s secondary into the end zone. Lerner’s point-after attempt was good for a 19-6 lead that effectively sealed the win.

    Before the half was over Mercy’s quarterback, Asaiah Wilson, and Paulo Foscolo had combined on a 58-yard scoring pass play, and Vaziri, in response, had run the ensuing kickoff back 80 yards, zipping by Wilson, the last defender, at midfield to keep East Hampton in the van.

    Mercy threatened when the third quarter began, moving the ball down to a first-and-goal inside the Bonac 10. But East Hampton’s defense held, containing Kent twice before Wilson took to the air twice, underthrowing his receiver in the end zone on third-and-goal and overthrowing Foscolo at the 3.

    Thereafter, the Bonackers ate up the clock, and, with a little more than 3 minutes remaining Vaziri came up with a big interception at East Hampton’s 35, a prelude to yet another 65-yard touchdown run by Heneveld.

    In short, it had been one of those rare games in which the Bonackers, whose defense has been porous in the past, could do no wrong.

    “I’m going to buy a lottery ticket,” Randi Cherill, the trainer, said as the final minutes ticked away.

    Bill Barbour Jr. told his happy players afterward that he was proud of them and that they should be proud of themselves. During a television interview, he said, “We’ve played a tough schedule, so tonight was an opportunity for our kids to let loose. We executed our game plan, which was to own the ball and control the clock with first downs mixed in with sudden strikes. . . .  Offensively, we took what their defense gave us, and defensively we made some big plays.”

    As for Babylon, “We know what they’ll bring — once you take a shot to the face you know what it feels like. But we’re excited — the kids will be up for it. It’s the first time we’ve been in the playoffs since 2009.”

    “We’d like to upset them,” Heneveld said.

    Jamie Wolf, whose suggested long count had drawn Mercy offside on fourth-and-2 at midfield midway through the fourth quarter, thus extending a drive — and taking more time off the clock — said that he thought the team would be able to ride its momentum into the post-season.