Joey Avallone Named Empire 8 Offensive Player of the Year

Joey Avallone had a flair for the dramatic, and it led to him having his best collegiate soccer season this past fall.

The 2020 Southampton High School graduate scored six goals and had four assists in 11 Empire 8 Conference contests for St. John Fisher, three of which were game-winning tallies. Overall, Avallone finished with 19 points with seven goals and five assists leading him to being named Empire 8 Offensive Player of the Year and garnering Empire 8 First Team Honors, announced on November 12.

“He obviously was our most dangerous attacking player, especially because he didn’t have a preferred foot,” St. John Fisher head coach Jack Burgasser said. “Most people predominantly use their right foot, but he was two-footed, and you don’t see that often, especially at the Division III level. Most often he’d be on the left wing and just use his speed to get past people and then deliver a quality ball with his left foot. Or, he could connect with people making central or weak-side runs. But Joey could also attack on the right side. His versatility was second to none.”

Avallone said a couple of things stood out to him personally this season. First, he made a position change from playing back to forward when he transferred to St. John Fisher from Medaille University, which he had to do when his former school closed due to a lack of funding. Although he had played back his first two years at Medaille, and before that at Southampton, Avallone said he had played forward when he was younger, so it wasn’t exactly the biggest challenge for him. But it did take some getting used to.

“After last season, I wanted to be one of the better attackers in the country and I achieved that,” he said.

Part of the reason for the position change was because St. John Fisher had some veteran backs already on the roster, so it was more of an opportunity for Avallone to get on the field. Burgasser said it was a combination of things

“Ultimately, we knew we had to get this kid on the field for us somewhere,” he said. “We were returning a very good left back and we thought if we put Joey further up the field, he’s a good soccer player. He has the ability to attack more. We need to have him on the field. He hit a great stride scoring goals last year, and as coaches it’s all about putting the pieces of the puzzle together to make it all fit. And I knew Joey was one of those pieces that had to be on the field.”

Avallone said he had heard rumblings that Medaille was going to close the spring of his junior year, but there was also a rumor that a nearby university was going to buy it and merge with it to keep it going. But just a few weeks later, his coach at Medaille told all of the players that the school would indeed be closing and that they’d have to find a new team.

Around that time it was May, Avallone said, and many teams already had their rosters filled for the upcoming fall season. But Avallone went into the transfer portal hoping to stay in the Empire 8 Conference. Medaille had just won the conference title the year the school closed.

Ultimately, what drew Avallone to St. John Fisher was its sports management program, which was his major at Madeille. Everything just fell into place after that.

“Obviously, with Medeille being in our conference and having won it the year before they closed, I had scouted and coached against Joey his first two years, so I knew firsthand he was a handful,” Burgasser said. “Predominantly, he played as a left back there and with the number of backs we already had, Joey knew he was probably going to have to change position, and he responded. It worked out really well that he had already been studying sports management, so a lot of things aligned for him here. I’m just glad he found a right fit for us. He really blossomed, which was great to see.”

Although St. John Fisher lost to No. 11 Babson in the opening round of the NCAA Division III National Championships — Avallone’s second appearance in such tournament, the first coming at Medeille — it was an overall strong season for the Cardinals. The conference champions won three of the five individual honors and had a league-high seven student-athletes earn All-Empire 8 honors.

Christian Burkhart was named the E8 Goalkeeper of the Year, after being named the Empire 8 Championship Tournament Most Valuable Player. Burgasser was named the Doug May Coach of the Year after leading the Cardinals to their third Empire 8 Championship in program history and second trip to the NCAA Tournament. St. John Fisher won the 2024 E8 Regular Season Championship and earned the top seed in the Empire 8 Tournament after going 8-1-2 in league play, outscoring opponents, 21-4. He coached six 2024 All-E8 selections. It is Burgasser’s third Doug May Coach of the Year honor.

The coaching award is named after May, who coached RIT from 1980 to 1996 and Nazareth from 1997 to 2003 before he died in April 2004.

St. John Fisher had a league-high four first team members and had a league-high seven student-athletes earn All-E8 honors. Ryan Brown and Jacob McGinnis joined Avallone and Burkhart on the First Team. Trevor Heschke, Riley Rease and Jack Tamburino were Second Team selections and Troy Jezioro was selected as St. John Fisher’s Sportsman of the Year.

Set to graduate this spring, Avallone said he’s looking forward to entering the workforce and would like to get into sports marketing or facility management, and stick around the game of soccer as a coach.

“It’s really fun,” he said of the game. “You make a lot of great memories, make a lot of great friendships along the way.”

Burgasser said Avallone will be missed as he moves on.

“One thing that made Joey really special was how incredibly competitive he was,” he said. “He was truly that guy that you hate to play against, but love to have on your team. He played with such intensity, he demanded a lot from his teammates, he truly hated to lose. That was another piece that I think made him so successful, if he was losing in training, he’d chew people out and demand a higher standard, and that rubbed off on people the right way.

“I’ve been coaching for 16 years, I played at SUNY Brockport, and a lot of people that come from that downstate/Long Island area have a swagger about them and he really exemplifies that. And I mean that in a positive stereotype,” Burgasser added. “He had that bite, that edge, that competitive intangible quality and it led to Joey having a really great senior season.”