No bye, no problem for Oceanside

Oceanside didn’t need a first-round bye or a home playoff game to go all the way to the Nassau Class AA girls’ soccer final as the No. 10 seed a year ago, but coach Marianna Winchester still prefers a smoother road to navigate.

“I think it’s always beneficial to get a bye, but at the same time we know it’s not the end of the world if we’re not one of the top four [seeds],” Winchester said after the Lady Sailors lost to defending county champion Massapequa, 2-0, in last Monday’s Conference AA-I regular-season finale to finish in fifth place. “We just have to go out and do what we do best, and that’s keep the ball down and move it up the field,” she added.

Amanda Garrity scored 4:11 into the game to give the Lady Chiefs an early lead and Rosie DiMartino provided the two-goal cushion at 23:36. The teams battled to a scoreless tie in the first meeting Oct. 3 at Massapequa in a game that saw junior goalkeeper Emily Doherty make 14 saves for the Lady Sailors. Doherty made 11 saves in Monday’s rematch and Emmalee Meyer turned aside 10 shots, including eight in the second half, for the winners.

“We played a lot better in the second half,” Winchester said. “We created scoring chances that we didn’t get in the first half.”

Despite Monday’s defeat, it wasn’t the last time Oceanside (6-5-3) will play at home in 2011. As the No. 5 seed, it will host a first-round playoff game this Friday against Conference AA-III champion Great Neck South. The winner gets No. 4 Mepham in a quarterfinal matchup on Halloween.

“Great Neck South is a great unknown,” Winchester said. “But last year we went into playoff games not knowing anything about Mepham or MacArthur, other than their undefeated records, and we won.”

Senior captain Danielle Rossi, who leads the Lady Sailors in goals with five, feels the team is capable of another deep playoff run. “We play our best when we’re under pressure,” she said. “It always seems like we’re the underdog. Most of our team is made up of juniors, but they’ve stepped up all year.”

Offensively, Rossi (twice) and fellow senior Melissa Horan, and juniors Heather Burns and Kelly Backus all had multi-goal games during the regular season. Rossi and Backus did it in the same game against Baldwin Oct. 19, Burns had a pair in the first meeting with Baldwin Sept. 27, Horan scored twice at Hicksville Oct. 17, and Rossi notched two in the first meeting with Hicksville Sept. 23.

“We have good offensive spurts, but I’d like to see more consistent pressure,” Winchester said.

Juniors Samantha Longo and Sinead Lucey spearhead the defense in front of Doherty, who has 97 saves and three shutouts on the year.

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