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Mostly Cloudy New beginnings at St. Raphael’s Winter Classic
The gymnasium at St. Raphael’s was flooded with arena-like lighting and the upbeat rhythms of DJ Javier Espinoza as fourth through eighth-grade basketball players competed as if they were in Madison Square Garden.
The Roman Catholic Church in East Meadow held its eleventh Winter Classic from Feb. 15 through the 25. Hosted by the church’s CYO basketball program, the Winter Classic is a boys’ basketball tournament that draws 40 CYO teams and roughly 400 players from parishes across Long Island.
“We take a lot of pride in the event,” said Dave Hudzik, the president of the Board of Directors for the CYO basketball program.
Before getting set to play on Feb. 24, the tournament honored Alex Clarke, the previous president, by presenting him with a plaque of recognition and gift certificate to Jake’s Steak House.
Clarke is stepping down after leading the CYO program for 10 years. “I’ll be lucky if I last that long,” Hudzik said with a laugh.
The tournament brought new and old friends together from across Nassau County and included a reunion between Hudzik and Ryan Fennelly, the coach of the fourth-grade boy’s basketball team at St. Agnes in Rockville Centre.
The two coaches knew each other since they played basketball as teenagers for St. John the Baptist and Chaminade high schools, respectively. “We had a great time,” Hudzik said, adding that the competition was intense, but friendly. In the end, St. Agnes took home the championship in the fourth-grade boys division.
After going through a rough patch last year, the St. Raphael’s fifth-grade boys team improved under Coach John Stergis and came back as champions in their division.
The sixth-grade champions came from St. Aloysius of Great Neck. And the seventh and eighth-grade winners were St. Raphael’s both of whom had won for the third consecutive year.
“The culture of our program just gets stronger and stronger,” Hudzik said, adding that the coaches and athletes, each year, get more involved and enthusiastic. “If you have a positive attitude and show you care, it spreads,” he said.
