Friday, October 16, 2026
Whether you were a spectator, player or coach on Hewlett High School’s football field on Oct. 9, the Bulldogs’ 23-20 victory over the Sewanhaka Ravens was magical: a 34-yard completion from quarterback Preston Cusumano to wide receiver Aaron Pahl set up Dylan Parchment’s 2-yard game-winning touchdown run. As the Bulldogs celebrated their centennial anniversary, the win became another page in the program’s history.
For student-athletes in Hewlett’s program, football is a year-round commitment. Players take part in offseason weightlifting programs, beginning in November, before transitioning to summer conditioning — including weekly seven-on-seven noncontact scrimmages, in which skill-position players from different schools compete against one another. After nine months, in mid-August, players don their full gear and hit the gridiron for the 10-week season.
If you asked a former player or coach, they might have trouble picking a favorite moment. “It’s really all the time spent around the team that I remember most,” Ryan May, a member of Hewlett’s class of 2020, wrote in a text message to the Herald.
From Blue Jackets to Bulldogs
For close to 70 years, the Blue Jackets — Hewlett’s former nickname — played their games just down the street, at Hewlett Elementary School. Before the days of video, Hewlett football was marred by a lack of success, including 26 consecutive losses from 1944 to 1948.
In the following 25 years, the program had some of its best moments. Teenage columnists like Toni Robin, a member of Hewlett’s class of 1977, captured weekly highlights for the Nassau Herald. She wrote about how Hewlett braved a torrential downpour to defeat Valley Stream South in a game dedicated to Drew Cascardi, for his efforts as a student-athlete. Cascardi died in 2019, of cancer.
Robin highlighted the efforts of alumni Brian Foster and Ricky Lyons — who scored touchdowns that wet Saturday afternoon — and John Amitrano Sr., Steve Cohen, Kenny Rochler, Gene Marosy and Dave Simpson.
“Around 4 o clock, if you happened to hear honking, it was the victory parade advertising the win,” Robin wrote. “That night was the victory party at ‘Amo’s’ house.”
In the 1980s, Hewlett adopted the Bulldog name and had its fair share of highlights. After falling to the Great Neck South Rebels in an intra-league championship showdown on Nov. 6, 1982, the returning players went undefeated in 1983. That same year, the team presented a Hewlett superfan known as Lenny — a World War II veteran — with his own jersey.
A new age of Hewlett football
Before the 1990 season, Hewlett hired Jay Iaquinta — one of the most decorated coaches in Nassau County over the past three and a half decades — as head coach. In 1992, the Bulldogs played their home games at Lynbrook’s Marion Street School while they awaited their brand-new home field at Hewlett High. The team didn’t surrender its first points of the season, a field goal, until mid-October.
The Bulldogs went 6-2 in 1992 despite having no Homecoming game and playing five of their first six games on the road. Hewlett would fall to a dominant Garden City team in the Big Four Champions semifinal, 28-13 — Garden City’s 28th consecutive win.
“We overcame a lot of obstacles and the kids bought in,” Iaquinta said of his early years. “They outworked a lot of their opponents, and that led to success.”
The program saw many talented players. The Bulldogs’ 1994 team was headlined by Matt Margulies, a.k.a. “Air Margulies,” a 6-foot-4, 235-pound quarterback who drew comparisons to Miami Dolphins star Dan Marino. Margulies was recruited by dozens of colleges schools before suiting up at quarterback for Dartmouth.
“He was a strong passer and was a leader,” Iaquinta said.
From 1992 to 2014, The Bulldogs were county champions once and Big Four Champions — teams that win their quarterfinal matchup — 12 times. They won a county title in 1999, the first in school history, which Iaquinta said was his favorite moment at Hewlett.
“The administration was good — I had great assistant coaches,” he recalled of his 26 years at the school. “The parents were real good to us, and obviously the kids were great, hardworking kids who wanted to be good. I have nothing but great memories about coaching at Hewlett, and I feel fortunate to have had the privilege to coach here.”
Iaquinta has amassed more than 210 victories in his career, from stints at Lynbrook, Hewlett, Manhasset and now as offensive coordinator at Bellmore-JFK. He was named Nassau County’s Coach of the Year in 1986 and 2021.
'I couldn't wait to be one of them'
Along Hewlett’s sidelines between 2010 and 2012, you might have seen some boys, no older than 11, passing out water bottles to players. Two of them were Max and Ryan May.
Ryan, now 24, said that watching the older players made him want to play football. He remembered being in Hewlett’s locker room before a playoff matchup with Lawrence when, he said, the players seemed to him like adults.
“At the time, I couldn’t wait to be one of them,” he wrote in a text message.
The May brothers began playing football in middle school. Playing in the fall from 2013 to 2019, Ryan said, kept him close with his friends, while he sharpened his skills.
On the field, Ryan said, he could feel the energy from head coach John Palladino and the rest of the staff, Palladino constantly pushed Ryan and his teammates to improve.
“I remember Coach Palladino always talking about the importance of ‘buying in,’” Ryan wrote. “It wasn’t until I started playing sports in college that I really understood what he meant.”
The May brothers moved on to play lacrosse at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pa. Max, a goalie, and Ryan, an attacker, had both played at Hewlett. Ryan now works in international tax services, and Max is in his third year of law school at Hofstra and will join Kirkland & Ellis, a firm in Manhattan, as a corporate associate next fall.
“I’m really grateful for the role [the coaches] played in helping me develop into the person I am today,” Ryan wrote. “More than anything, I think my favorite part was the people.”
