Tom Rock: Mount Sinai's Joey Spallina has cemented his legacy as king of Long Island lacrosse

Joey Spallina was in preschool when his father, Joe, handed him his first lacrosse stick. Pretty soon he was bouncing tennis balls off the sliding glass doors in the family home in Rocky Point. “No window was safe,” his mother Mary Beth said, recalling all those thumps and smudges.

As he grew up that stick was never far from reach. He’d watch television in the living room or hold conversations in the kitchen and all the while he was twirling it around his head or behind his back.

“Some kids play video games,” Joe said. “For him that was his video game.”

He developed into one of the highest-profile high school players in the country at Mt. Sinai, committed to Syracuse, and in nearly four full seasons there has become the target of nearly as much praise as ridicule. He’s become the top scorer in the fabled program’s history but hasn’t yet been able to accomplish what he set out to do there, win a national championship.

He has two games left to shoot for that next weekend thanks to his three goals and three assists in a 13-11 win over North Carolina in an NCAA Division I men’s lacrosse quarterfinal at Hofstra on Saturday.

No matter what happens in the Final Four, though, he leaves Long Island for the last time as a high school or college player already wearing a crown of sorts. His final appearance here – at least before he inevitably returns as a pro – was in front of 10,244 fans that included so many of them wearing his jersey or T-shirts with his name on the back.

“He stepped up on the biggest stage in front of all his friends and family,” his father Joe said between hearty handshakes, emotional hugs, and about a trillion pats on the back while the Syracuse fans celebrated the victory. “The Island is his. He’s the King of the Island.”

Spallina was going to be the show, the story, whether he won or lost on Saturday. That’s the deal when you put the number 22 on your back and embrace the expectations of an entire sport. Spallina has no regrets about that.

He just judges himself differently and in other ways than others do.

“My imprint as a player, I don’t think that’s really up to me,” he said. “I just tried to be the best guy, the best teammate, the best person I could be. Whether that’s signing every autograph for the kids or interacting with all the people who come out and support us. To me, being a good person and leaving that kind of imprint is pretty big.”

That’s what being number 22 for Syracuse means to him… even if it took nearly four full years to realize it. And as he spoke about the mythology of that number his head coach Gary Gait, the Hall of Famer and original 22 for the program, nodded and smiled.

“He’s doing a great job,” Gait said. “He’s come a long way and really matured. He’s figured out that it really is about winning and putting the team first. Whatever the teams needs out of him he delivers, so it’s been great.”

While Spallina is looking forward, this final afternoon on Long Island came with some nostalgia too.

.@SpallinaJoey embraced by his parents on Saturday after helping @CuseMLAX defeat @UNCMensLacrosse in the NCAA quarterfinals at Hofstra. pic.twitter.com/XCT1JOoCpG

— Newsday Sports (@NewsdaySports) May 17, 2026

He recalled the days when he would skip school and join his father, Joe, who was coaching the Long Island Lizards at the time. “I pretty much grew up on this field,” he said of Hofstra’s stadium. It was his chance to be around some all-time greats such as Paul Rabil and Rob Panell. Now his name is as big as theirs and kids line up for him to sign their stuff.

He said he wanted to soak in hearing his name called out over the public address at the stadium for the final times. “That voice will be forever stuck in my head,” he said.

And he wanted to give a shoutout to his buddies from high school who had come out to support him at this farewell… for better or for worse. “I don’t condone anything they did or said because I know they are absolutely nuts,” he laughed.

He also knew there was someone he wanted to win this game for more than himself, more than his teammates even.

His dad, the guy who had set him on this course, is the head coach of the Stony Brook University women’s lacrosse program. On Thursday they lost their quarterfinal game in the most agonizing way possible, allowing the game-winning goal in the final fraction of a second of play.

“He actually told me, he said, ‘We’re going to get this one for you,’” Joe Spallina said. “He knew I needed it. I told him, ‘My heart can’t take another heartbreaker.’”

It didn’t need to. It was busy bursting with joy.

“He’s put his whole life into something and he’s chasing his dreams down,” Joe Spallina said. “As his coach, I’m not surprised. As a parent, you just want it so bad for him… He’s played a million games in his life. Now it’s two games to cement his legacy.”

Maybe. Or maybe that legacy has already been cast. At least on Long Island it has been.