The New York State Public High School Athletic Association (NYSPHSAA) announced over the summer its spring 2017 Scholar-Athlete teams.

These schools were officially honored during an event on Thursday, September 14 at Holbrook Country Club.

The School of Excellence and School of Distinction Awards were handed out. The School of Excellence Award recognizes schools who have 75 percent of its varsity programs receive the Scholar-Athlete Team Award over the academic school year. The School of Distinction Award recognizes schools who have 100 percent of its varsity programs receive the Scholar-Athlete Team Award.

Section XI member school honorees include:

NYS Schools of Distinction

• Babylon High School
• Elwood/John Glenn High School
• Rocky Point High School
• Shelter Island High School

NYS Schools of Excellence

• Comsewogue High School
• Miller Place High School
• Sachem High School East
• Sachem High School North
• Smithtown High School East
• Smithtown High School West

According to the state, last spring 2,064 teams received the Scholar-Athlete Team Award. Even more impressive, 35,301 student-athletes received an individual grade point average of 90.00 or above, and have been recognized as Individual Scholar-Athletes. The change in this year’s program resulted in over 1,200 more individual scholar-athletes being recognized during this spring season compared to the spring 2016 season.

“Congratulations to our member schools and student-athletes,” said Executive Director Robert Zayas. “We continue to be proud of this program especially this year in which we recognized an additional 1,200 student-athletes achieving high standards in the classroom. We are excited to have the opportunity to expand this program to honor even more students for the academic excellence.”

The Sachem East football program retired the jersey number of Josh Mileto during a ceremony on Saturday afternoon.

The Arrows played host to Lindenhurst, whose supporters wore red to honor Josh and Sachem community.

It’s almost that time … fall sports! The season kicks off later this week. We know, we can’t believe the summer went that fast too, but we’re excited about the sports action to come!

Make sure you’re getting your schedule right before September arrives because Section XI fall sports will be plentiful.

You can access our full slate of games for all sports on the Section XI Schedule Page.

Good luck and enjoy!

Multiple individuals from Section XI have been named as “Coaches of the Year” by the New York State Public High School Athletic Association (NYSPHSAA).

The following individuals were honored:

• Lou Hanner Boys Soccer Elwood High School
• Bob Szymanski Boys Cross Country Shoreham Wading River High School
• Paul Koretzki Girls Cross Country Shoreham Wading River High School
• Ann Naughton Field Hockey Smithtown East High School

The honors were announced at a NYSPHSAA Central Committee meeting this summer.

According to a note from Ron Woodruff from the New York State Coaches Association, coaches are selected based on years of coaching, win-lose records, participations in league/sectional committees, and being a positive role model within their school and community.

A Suffolk native and wrestling coaching has helped guide a high school athlete to not only walk again, but wrestle.

“The kids would help him,” Smith said of Cristian Penland. “The kids really got it. He’s part of our team. He always had a partner in the wrestling room, someone was always on the mat with him, always helping him to learn, showing him how to do stuff.”

Read this inspiring story about Smithtown alum, Kevin Smith and his wrestling team … click for more!

Led by the largest one-year increase in girls participation in 16 years, the overall number of participants in high school sports increased for the 28th consecutive year in 2016-17, according to the annual High School Athletics Participation Survey conducted by the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS).

Based on figures from the 51 NFHS member state high school associations, which includes the District of Columbia, the number of participants in high school sports reached an all-time high of 7,963,535. The increase of 94,635 participants from 2015-16 is the largest one-year jump in overall participation since the 2008-09 school year.

The top 10 states by participants remained the same; however, Florida moved ahead of Michigan to seventh position this year. Texas and California topped the list again with 834,558 and 800,364 participants, respectively, followed by New York (367,849), Illinois (341,387), Ohio (340,146), Pennsylvania (319,153), Florida (310,567), Michigan (295,647), New Jersey (283,655) and Minnesota (239,289).

CLICK TO READ MORE!

Rich Castellano graduated from Deer Park and made a legacy as the girls’ basketball coach at Northport.

For his efforts he was officially inducted to the NYSPHSAA Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony in late July at the 1000 Island Harbor Hotel in Clayton, NY.

Since starting his coaching career in 1979, Castellano has won 613 games as head coach of the girls basketball team at Northport High School, ranking him top five in New York State.

Furthermore, he won 24 league titles, ten Suffolk County Championships, five Long Island Championships, was a New York State Semi Finalist three times, and a New York State Finalist once in 1992.

Read more about Rich!