By TONY BELLISSIMO
The Marines, who trailed by six points at the half and at the end of three quarters, scored the tying touchdown with 2:49 remaining on a heads-up lateral by Marlon Jones to Chris Tierney that completed a 56-yard scoring play. But Michael Trojanowski blocked the extra-point for the Comets, and Bob McAuley and Mike Luyster made the big plays down the stretch to give them a 20-13 victory.
McAuley hauled in a 64-yard pass from quarterback Tom Butler to give second-seeded Hicksville the ball on the Long Beach 10-yard line in the closing minute. Rather than run the clock and settle for a go-ahead field-goal try, Comets coach Barney Dell-Aquila decided to give the ball to his large fullback, Luyster, who went nine yards on first down, got stopped on second down, but on third down dove over a pile of bodies for the winning touchdown with 11 seconds left.
It was a tough loss to swallow for the eighth-seeded Marines, who must regroup and travel to East Meadow on Thursday evening at 7 p.m.
"We snatched defeat from the jaws of victory," LB coach Dan Quinn said. "It was a missed opportunity, but I'm proud of how we played. We kept battling and wore them down. The good news is we get a chance to get it out of our system right away."
Long Beach trailed 13-0 in the first quarter after Luyster picked off senior Jose Rodriguez's pass and brought it back 27 yards for a touchdown. Luyster opened the scoring with a 10-yard touchdown run.
"Two years ago, we could've gotten on the bus at that point and gone home," Quinn said. "But we just went back to business and made a game of it."
The Marines got on the scoreboard with 7:52 left in the half when senior Paul Solomon capped a 91-yard drive with a 13-yard touchdown run. Rodriguez, an All-County performer who rushed for 75 yards and passed for 155, had the big play, a 51-yard gain on an option keeper.
"With the exception of two interceptions, Jose had a tremendous game," Quinn said. "He had some good reads and threw some nice balls."
Jones caught four passes from Rodriguez for 110 yards, the biggest of which came on a third-and-14 from the Long Beach 44-yard line with the Marines trailing 13-7 and time on the Comets' side. Jones caught the ball behind McAuley and raced down the field, only to be caught by Hicksville cornerback Kwabena Asante. Jones, however, spotted Tierney trailing the play and calmly tossed him the ball as he was being dragged down. Tierney took the lateral and ran into the end zone to make it 13-13.
"It was pretty exciting," said Quinn, who second-guessed himself about not calling a time-out prior to the blocked extra-point attempt.
The key now for the Marines is to not look back. East Meadow won its opener, 28-7, over Port Washington and will be fired up to avenge last year's loss to Long Beach.
"They have three outstanding players and great size overall," Quinn said. "It'll be size vs. speed. It's a huge game for both teams."
