Aidan Winter dominates for Babylon to end Bayport-Blue Point's 37-game Suffolk winning streak
Aidan Winter of Babylon cuts through the Bayport-Blue Point line in the first quarter on Friday. Credit: Michael A. Rupolo Sr.
Aidan Winter and the Babylon football team arrived in Bayport Friday night ready to make a statement.
Message delivered.
Winter ran for 345 yards and four touchdowns on 26 carries to lead visiting Babylon to a 27-6 win over Bayport-Blue Point in Suffolk Division IV football.
The Panthers improved to 6-0 and claimed sole possession of first place in the division.
Bayport-Blue Point (5-1) has won three straight Suffolk IV titles and two of the last three Long Island Class IV championships. Friday marks the Phantoms’ first loss to a Suffolk opponent since a 26-23 defeat against Shoreham-Wading River on Nov. 19, 2021, snapping a 37-game winning streak.
“This doesn’t prove anything,” Winter said. “We’ve got to keep on improving week to week. I would not want to do this with any other team. I love these guys.”
After Phantoms running back Collin Reyer punched in a 4-yard touchdown run to cut BBP’s deficit to 14-6 at the end of the third quarter, Winter wasted no time giving Babylon some breathing room.
On third-and-4, Winter broke a 55-yard run down to the 11-yard line. On the next play, he bounced a run to the right sideline and ran a defender over at the goal line to give Babylon a 21-6 lead with 10:16 left.
After Zack Vasquez and JJ Reid combined for a sack to force a turnover on downs with 6:11 remaining, Winter put the exclamation mark on the game. He ran the ball seven straight times for 65 yards, including a 29-yard TD run with 1:54 left to seal the win.
“He’s the best kid we’ve seen all year. He’s one of the best kids I’ve seen since I’ve been coaching,” BBP coach Mike Zafonte said. “And it’s not just him, they block for him. They’re a good team.”
The Panthers opened the game with a 16-play, 72-yard drive that took up 9:34, but ended with Winter losing a fumble at the goal line.
“It set a fire,” Winter said. “We had a team meeting and one of my coaches said, ‘When we played Bayport the last two years, you didn’t show up.’ I said, ‘I got you this week.’ I fumbled here and I said, ‘Alright, that’s it. Now I need to turn it up.’”
Winter broke an 83-yard TD run on the first play of Babylon’s next drive.
The senior had 11 tackles and blocked a PAT. Miles Varley had nine tackles and Vasquez and Jaiden Millner each had eight tackles. Christian Seidenberg and Joe Rubendall helped the Panthers’ defense stifle a BBP offense that averaged 53.2 points per game through the first five weeks.
“What they’ve done, going undefeated for four years, that’s a record that can’t go unnoticed,” Babylon coach Rick Punzone said. “Coach Zafonte and his whole program deserve a ton of credit.”
“I strongly believe that you learn more from failure than you do from success,” Zafonte said. “The question is: What are we going to learn from this? This is going to be a defining moment for our team, how we respond. I’m looking forward to it.”
Matt Lindsay is a high school sports reporter who joined Newsday in 2022 after graduating from Stony Brook University.
