The ice is finally melting for these seniors.<\/p>\n
Long Island\u2019s high school hockey championship between the Friars of St. Anthony\u2019s and Marines of Long Beach promises to be a spirited finale Saturday at 4 p.m. at the Northwell Health Ice Center, but it\u2019s also a touching farewell for many outstanding teens who poured their hearts and souls into both programs ahead of what will be their final match.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s really sad. I\u2019ve seen a lot of people come and go on this team,\u201d Long Beach senior captain and center Michael Calvi told The Post.<\/p>\n
Michael Calvi poses for a portrait next to a memorial for Gerrin Hagen, a former teammate who passed away, during Long Beach high school hockey team practice on March 11, 2026. Heather Khalifa for the NY Post<\/p>\n
Calvi took the \u201cC\u201d on his sweater to heart and kept his Marine corps shipshape. The team ushered in a wild wave of success with a 13-game win streak, which they rode straight into the Nassau finals.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt really got us together as a team, and helped us grow,\u201d senior center Joseph Feerick said of the lengthy heater Long Beach hasn\u2019t had for many years.<\/p>\n
The exclamation point was beating rival Bellmore-Merrick 5-4 in dramatic double-overtime fashion to clinch the county title thanks to the heroics of forward Liam Young.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt took a while to know it went in; the ref was just standing there for about 10 seconds,\u201d said backup goalie Sophie Marino, a dual winter sport gymnast who went out for hockey as a senior.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo one thought it went in \u2014 and then we got the ref\u2019s hand signal and everybody jumped off the bench,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
Sands of time\u00a0<\/p>\n
Marino gives her sole season a 10 out of 10, adding, \u201cI don\u2019t even have the words to explain\u201d the magic of playing for the Marines.<\/p>\n
Calvi has also deeply reflected on how special it\u2019s been, particularly in becoming a leader and hoping he did right by teammates past and present.<\/p>\n
Michael Calvi poses for a portrait during Long Beach high school hockey team practice in Long Beach, N.Y. on Wednesday, March 11, 2026. Heather Khalifa for the NY Post<\/p>\n
One especially comes to mind, former player Gerrin Hagen, a Long Beach hockey force who was killed by a car at 18 while skateboarding in 2023.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was a great kid, great captain. He showed us what we need to do on and off the ice. He was a great guy,\u201d said Calvi, who was a freshman when Hagen played.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a Long Beach tradition that senior captains assign players\u2019 spots in the dressing room, and Calvi was placed right next to Hagen\u2019s old spot, which he called \u201can absolute honor.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI would look at that stall as a freshman and think, \u2018I really want to be there someday.\u2019 So I\u2019m really, really grateful,\u201d Calvi said.<\/p>\n
\u201cNow we want to end on a good note.\u201d<\/p>\n
Friar focus\u00a0<\/p>\n
It\u2019s all in the family for St. Anthony\u2019s, which took Suffolk County in a barn burner over rival Smithtown Bulls in a best-of-three series, one that came down to the final goal.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re on a text thread every night before each game, making sure everybody\u2019s getting to bed and doing what they\u2019ve got to do,\u201d said senior captain Zack Sirel.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis place has built up my confidence in a way I wouldn\u2019t have gotten elsewhere \u2026 and friendship, kindness to others, you always get that around here. It\u2019s never anything different.\u201d<\/p>\n
St. Anthony\u2019s hockey captain Zack Sirel. St. Anthony’s Athletics<\/p>\n
He\u2019s going to miss the little things about the Friar hockey brotherhood, especially a pregame rite of passage unique to the Catholic school.<\/p>\n
The team recites \u201cThe Husker\u2019s Prayer\u201d \u2014 a decade-long custom first introduced by an alum looking to bolster locker room culture before each puck drop.<\/p>\n
It reads, in part, \u201cif we shall win, let it be by the code. With faith and honor held high, if we shall lose, let us stand by the road, and cheer as the winners go by.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe set the tone with that prayer,\u201d the captain added.<\/p>\n
The honor of reciting it belongs to assistant captain Tommy Azzaritti, whose senior year focused on his personal redemption.<\/p>\n
He missed a potential playoff-clinching shootout goal during his sophomore year in a series the Friars lost to the Bulls, which has admittedly lived rent-free in his head.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought about it every day for the last three years,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The forward wasn\u2019t to be fooled twice, as he scored the lone goal in game one\u2019s shootout this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cI really wanted to just go in and roof one, but I had to make a few head fakes and just move the puck around a little bit and put it over him,\u201d said Azzaritti.<\/p>\n
\u201cI blacked out after scoring that goal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now the Friar leaders are all in for one more game under the hood.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re prepared for what comes,\u201d Sirel said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The ice is finally melting for these seniors. Long Island\u2019s high school hockey championship between the Friars of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":217303,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[2044,131,133,132,2890,127],"class_list":["post-217302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-high-school-sports","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news","tag-long-island","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217302"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217302\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}