South Side musters playoff run

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The South Side Cyclones baseball team turned plenty of heads the last couple of weeks with their memorable playoff run and have set themselves up nicely for the future.

Following a 12-6-1 regular season (8-6-1 in Conference A-3), sixteenth-ranked South Side held off No. 15 Island Trees in the Nassau Class A out-bracket game before stunning top-seeded Garden City in the first round. The Cyclones eventually lost to MacArthur and conference-rival Plainedge in the double elimination tournament to end their season, but the seeds for a potentially successful 2020 were already planted.

“Not only are they talented, but they are a great group of young men,” coach Tom Smith said. “They’re already thirsty for next year.”

The Cyclones, who won eight games in 2018, started the season strong by winning nine of the first 10 contests before going on an 0-4-1 slide that would prove costly in their chase for the conference title. They righted themselves by winning the final game against Hewlett on May 2 before taking two of three from Roslyn entering the playoffs.

“We kind of ran into our little buzzsaw,” Smith said of the slump. “We got swept by [Bethpage] and it took a little bit for us to get our feet back under us.”

On May 14, starting pitcher Sean Kelly gutted his way through four innings against Island Trees before giving way to senior Grant Goodlad, who tossed three innings of shutout ball while striking out four to save the 4-2 win. Junior Anthony Pericolosi, who batted .485 with 25 RBIs this season, had RBI singles in each of the first two innings and the Cyclones also got run-scoring hits from John LaCava and Jason Schwartz.

South Side had less than 24 hours to prepare for 16-game winner Garden City, which had won eight of nine entering the postseason. Senior Tyler Costaro made his final appearance in a Cyclone uniform a memorable one by hurling a complete-game five-hitter while striking out six in a heartstopping 2-0 win over the Trojans.

“Tyler did phenomenally,” Smith said. “Both his fastball and his curveball, pinpoint accuracy all day.”

Pericolosi, an All-County selection this year, was again the hitting star by driving in both of the game’s runs in the fifth inning.

The dream run quickly ended over the next two days at No. 8 MacArthur (12-2 score) and No. 9 Plainedge (11-4), teams that the Cyclones went 4-0 against during the regular season.

“You can see that we got tired,” he said. “Four days in a row, emotional baseball. We ran out of gas.”

Costaro finished the season 4-0 with a 3.23 earned-run average and 37 strikeouts in 39 innings pitched. He was instrumental in stopping the Cyclones’ mini-slide with a three-hit shutout at Hewlett.

Ryan Riccio batted .347 with 20 runs scored and 15 stolen bases to earn All-Conference honors. Senior catcher LaCava, who hit .285 while throwing out 38 percent of would-be base stealers, and junior pitcher Danny Kelleher, who went 4-2 with a 1.14 WHIP, were named All League.