Floyd football honored at Suffolk Hall of Fame

BY LAURA ALBANESE | laura.albanese@newsday.com

April 29, 2008

Kerri Bettenhauser-Pratt and Keith Osik of Shoreham-Wading River were inducted into the Suffolk County Sports Hall of Fame at the Patchogue Theatre in Patchogue on Monday night. (Newsday/Joseph D. Sullivan / April 29, 2008)

For three years, the William Floyd football team hasn't known what it's like to lose. The Colonials have earned 33 straight victories, three straight Suffolk championships and three Long Island titles, a feat unmatched in more than a century of Long Island football.

Monday night at the Patchogue Theater, the football program that's well on its way toward establishing a high school dynasty added to its cachet.

William Floyd's football team was named the recipient of the Suffolk County Sports Hall of Fame's Special Recognition Award, given to the program that has made the greatest contribution to the Suffolk athletic community in the past three years.

The night's festivities also included the induction of eight of the Island's most influential athletic contributors: Keith Osik, Keri Bettenhauser-Pratt, Judy Kopelman, Phyllis Denevy, Al Ellis, Jonathan Reese, Kenny Schroy and Alicia Conquest-Bulgin.

"We've had this great run and this is the icing on the cake," Floyd coach Paul Longo said. "The past three years have seemed like this giant season that's going great and ending hot. We're excited. It's another great step for us."

Longo attributed the program's success to the coaching staff and the team's involvement in the community. Players work with Longo's fifth- and sixth-grade two-hand touch football league as coaches and referees and get involved in other outreach programs. In return, younger athletes are honed from their middle-school years, said Floyd athletic director Mark Mensch.

"A lot of it has to do with the development of our players through the youth football organizations," Mensch said. "These kids get better and better so that by the time they come to us, we just have to polish, not teach."

The honor, said quarterback Joe Sidaras, ranks up there with winning the Long Island championship.

"Over the past three years, we've built a dynasty," he said, "and it's great for three teams to get recognized."

"It's an honor," said running back Brock Jackolski, adding that the team's strong work ethic put Floyd in its enviable position.

"We don't eat lunch," he said, "we go to the film room."

Floyd wasn't the only school to win big. Inductees Bettenhauser-Pratt and Osik are products of Shoreham-Wading River. Bettenhauser-Pratt, a three-sport athlete who went on to play field hockey for Northeastern, led her team to four straight NCAA Tournament appearances.

"It's such a high honor to be in the company of these people," she said, referencing past members of the Suffolk Hall, including Carl Yastrzemski, the Red Sox Hall of Famer from Bridgehampton, and Ducks part-owner Bud Harrelson of Hauppauge.

Osik, a former Pittsburgh Pirates catcher who now coaches Farmingdale State baseball, said he is "humbled" by his selection.

"I was lucky enough to work and do something that I love and stay in baseball," he said. "I was amazed that of any Suffolk athlete to be chosen, I was one of the few."