Massapequa football shows its championship-caliber resilience in winning LI title

For a football coach, a roller-coaster of emotions occurs when your star quarterback goes down.

Massapequa coach Kevin Shippos experienced the ride in the first half of the team’s season opener, when senior signal-caller Paul Dulanto went down with a knee injury.

“Well, the first thing is, how bad is the injury?” Shippos said. “A kid who’s very strong-willed, strong-minded, he was like, ‘I’m ready, I can go back in.’ When he went to the bench, we didn’t know how bad it was at the time … It slowly got worse.”

Shippos’ mindset quickly had to change, turning to junior backup Joey Diesso. A broken hand limited Diesso’s reps during the summer, but, as Shippos said, “the rest is history.”

Diesso led a dominant Massapequa offense that averaged 35.1 points per game to a perfect 12-0 season, validated by a 35-7 win over Floyd in the Long Island Class I championship on Nov. 24.

“Paulie going down, obviously, was very unfortunate for the team,” Diesso said. “But I knew that I worked all offseason for an opportunity for this. And Paulie went down, I was ready and showed that I was prepared, I guess.”

Diesso was more than prepared, finishing the season with 20 touchdown passes, 1,136 passing yards and a 60.2% completion percentage. He shined on Long Island’s biggest stage, completing 11 of 15 passes for 146 yards and a touchdown and rushing for a score against Floyd.

Massapequa had no problems winning its first six games, but a Week 7 game against Farmingdale marked a turning point in Diesso’s development.

“That was really Joey’s first time in a postseason environment with a rivalry with Farmingdale, first place on the line,” Shippos said. “He had some bumps in the road there during that game, and it was like, ‘All right. The training wheels are off, now here you go.’”

Running back Tyler Villalta had two touchdowns and the winning two-point conversion to knock off the previously undefeated Dalers, 15-14, in overtime on Oct. 21, a game where Diesso only completed five passes for 39 yards.

Massapequa beat Syosset, 34-12, in the regular-season finale, then won its four postseason games by an average margin of 32.8 points per game. Twelve of Diesso’s touchdown passes came in the final five games.

Shippos said opponents would try to take away Villalta and fellow back Michael DeLuca when Dulanto went down, an unenforceable task because of Massapequa’s spread offense. Experienced receivers Robby Nugent and Dean Vitale also made life easier for Diesso and the run game. Massapequa’s offensive line, which Shippos calls “the bulls,” was extremely smart, tough and used its speed to its advantage. Tackles Massimo Musso and Jason Kovaluskie, guards Leo Rosario and Tristan Tarasi, and center Dan McWilliams led the way. Thomas Francis and AJ Molenko also were key contributors. 

Massapequa also relied on a championship defense, which allowed only 8.9 points per game.

“Having that defense, the best defense on the Island, it really makes us more comfortable as an offense,” Diesso said. “We can do more. If we make a mistake, turn the ball over, we know they got our back.”

Massapequa has become a championship town, winning three Nassau titles and two Long Island crowns since the spring 2021 season.

“I wouldn’t want to play for any other town,” Diesso said. “I wouldn’t want to have any other team across my chest. Having a whole town behind you … it’s just awesome.”

By Ben Dickson

benjamin.dickson@newsday.com@bendickson__

Ben Dickson joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins' teams.