Long Island Ducks ride hot streak, record-breaking performances into Atlantic League playoffs
Jorge Bonifacio, left, of the Long Island Ducks congratulates Wilmer Difo for his home run in the first inning of an Atlantic League game against the Staten Island FerryHawks on June 7. Credit: Peter Frutkoff
The Long Island Ducks finished in second during the first half of the Atlantic League season, four games out of a playoff spot behind Hagerstown. That’s where the Ducks largely spent their second half as well, sitting right behind York in a tight playoff race.
Only the Ducks didn’t stay treading water; they broke single-season franchise records and finished as the hottest team in the league amid a wild month of baseball.
The Ducks won 12 of their final 14 games to finish with a 43-20 record in the second half, tied for first place with York. Long Island held the tiebreaker with a 9-6 head-to-head record in the second half against the Revolution, sending the Ducks to the playoffs for the first time since 2023 and the first time under manager Lew Ford.
“It’s exciting, we have a great team and coaching staff,” Ford said. “It came down to the last game of the year, and the players really stepped up and continued to not give up.”
With righthanded pitcher Leonardo Taveras going against Hagerstown’s Connor Curlis, the Ducks begin a best-of-5 series with the Flying Boxcars in the Atlantic League’s North Division Championship Series Tuesday at Fairfield Properties Ballpark at 6:35 p.m.
Lefthanded pitcher Nick Margevicius will start Game 2 on Wednesday in Central Islip before righthander Anthony Escobar starts at Meritus Park Friday. If necessary, Michael Dominguez will start Game 4 Saturday before a possible Game 5 Sunday.
The Ducks finished the regular season with the best overall record in the Atlantic League (80-46) but were two games out of a playoff spot when they entered a six-game series on Sept. 1 against first-place York.
After splitting the first four games, the Ducks won 12-9 courtesy of Anthony Garcia’s three home runs, becoming the fourth Duck to do so in the franchise’s history. Wilmer Difo then swiped two bags in an 8-2 win and broke Mel Stocker’s single-season franchise record of 56 stolen bases.
“It just changes the game,” Ford said of Difo’s 60 stolen bases. “I love it; if you can exploit a weakness — whether it’s the pitcher not holding the runner, the catcher not being able to throw or the pitcher throwing a lot of off-speed pitches — they have to be worried about us from top to bottom.”
York won its final three games against Staten Island, but Long Island swept Southern Maryland to clinch the North Division.
“That was great for us, because we’ve been hunting that this year since we started,” outfielder Jorge Bonifacio said. “That’s the first step. You have to get in the playoffs to have the chance to win the championship.”
The playoff-clinching win came in historic fashion as Bonifacio hit his 30th home run of the season — breaking Carl Everett’s franchise record of 29 — to help the Ducks win 6-1.
Bonifacio, named as the team’s MVP, also set the franchise’s single-season record with 108 RBIs — surpassing Ray Navarette’s tally of 103 — and committed zero errors in 86 games. He’s one of five Ducks with at least 150 plate appearances to boast a .900 OPS or better.
“We just need to keep playing the same baseball we’ve been playing lately,” Bonifacio said. “If we do that, we have a really good chance.”
Michael Sicoli covers high school sports for Newsday. He graduated from Quinnipiac in 2022 and left with a master’s degree in sports journalism in 2023.
