Westhampton Beach Football Defeats Lawrence To Win Its First Ever Long Island Championship; Laube Finishes Career In Record-Breaking Style

Nov 27, 2017 3:21 PM

Perfection—it is often sought after, but very rarely achieved.The Westhampton Beach football team accomplished just that—an unblemished 12-0 season—after it defeated Lawrence, 54-26, for its first ever Long Island Championship at Kenneth P. LaValle Stadium at Stony Brook University on Sunday.

It was also a record-breaking day for Westhampton Beach senior Dylan Laube, who topped off the season—and his high school career—in style, scoring six touchdowns to tie a Long Island Championship single-game record, originally set by Sayville’s Zach Sirico back in 2011 in a 78-61 win over Lawrence. Laube—who rushed for 227 yards on 25 carries—also set a new Long Island record for touchdowns in a single season with 47, passing the previous record of 45 set by North Babylon’s Jason Gwaltney, who achieved the feat in both 2003 and 2004.

Westhampton Beach head coach Bill Parry, who has been on the sidelines the past 21 years, said after Sunday’s win that with so many injuries to start the season he didn’t think his team was going to achieve all that it has this season.

“I would have never dreamed that this was going to take place, to be real honest with you. I would have bet against us,” he said. “It was the next-man-up mentality the whole year. A bunch of young kids stepped up until the older kids made it back, and they were awesome. The older kids made it back and we just started rolling.”

For the players, especially the seniors, winning the Long Island Championship has been a dream come true.

“I feel like I’m dreaming right now. I can’t even describe it,” senior captain Craig Connor said. “It’s something that I’ll remember for the rest of my life.”

As for Laube, who will begin his collegiate career next fall at the University of New Hampshire, Parry said he will never be forgotten. On top of his record-breaking and record-tying accomplishments on Sunday, Laube ran for 2,680 yards this season, the third highest in Long Island history behind Gwaltney (2,882) and Plainedge’s Davien Kuinlan (2,781), according to Newsday.

“He’s broken every single record in Westhampton history, and now he’s broken the Long Island [scoring] record,” Parry explained. “But Dylan is a team player, he’s a team guy. He didn’t care about the records, he didn’t care about any of that stuff. All he cared about was winning and that’s what I’ll remember about Dylan.”

Westhampton Beach led the entire game and Lawrence never really threatened. Midway through the second quarter, trailing by 14 points, the Golden Tornadoes used a jump pass play on 4th and 1, where junior quarterback Christian Fredericks ran to the line of scrimmage, stopped, leaped and passed the ball to senior Christian Rodas, who caught the ball in tight coverage and ran 60 yards for what was thought to be a touchdown that would have brought Lawrence a touchdown away from tying the game, but it was brought back due to a holding penalty.

Due to the pass completion, Lawrence was still awarded the first down on the penalty and kept its drive alive, eventually bringing the ball to the Westhampton Beach 17-yard line. But with just two seconds left, Fredericks dropped back to pass and was pressured by linebackers Liam McIntyre, a junior, and sophomore Shavar Coffey; Coffey eventually got to Fredericks for the sack, ending the first half with the Canes leading 20-6.

The Canes got going quickly in the second half, with Laube scoring his third touchdown less than two minutes in. Later in the third quarter, junior quarterback Clarke Lewis connected with senior receiver Nolan Quinlan on a perfectly-executed play-action pass play that went 64 yards just a minute after Lawrence scored a touchdown.

After having sacked Fredericks on a 4th and 8 to force a turnover on downs, Laube broke the single-season scoring record with 2:07 remaining in the third on one of his signature long runs, this one from 69 yards. He tied the Long Island Championship record of six touchdowns in a game on a 5-yard run with 2:31 remaining.

In typical Laube fashion, he heralded his offensive line—center Jake Bennett, guards Kurt Mion and Edon Popi and tackles Lucas Villareale and Charles Fee—and his good friend McIntyre, the team’s starting fullback on offense, who scored a touchdown of his own on Sunday.

“It means everything to the whole team, to the whole community,” he said of the win. “It feels great, seriously. I’m just so happy. The whole team played great every single game ... every single game.”

The cohesiveness of the team is really what fueled it this season, Connor explained.

“We played as such a unit,” he said. “We go to camp in the summer, we do so much together, they’re my brothers. They’re people I hang out with on the weekends, people I talk to if I have problems.

“People argue that there are teams more talented than us, but we play together and we play hard, and that’s our strongest suit, that we’re a tight-knit unit,” he said.

From when the team started training in the spring, to going away for preseason camp in the summer, McIntyre said the team realized this past week that it’s been a non-stop ride the past 26 weeks. While that ride has come to an end, it’s one that will surely be remembered forever.

“It’s surreal, right now, the feeling,” McIntyre said. “We put in so much work. We’re 26 weeks deep ... for it to finally pay off and to have the perfect season—Long Island Champions—it’s the greatest feeling in the world right now.”