Blue Devil Soccer in Transition
The Huntington High School boys' soccer team is in transition. The Blue Devils lost several top players to graduation and its leading goal scorer moved to Nassau County. Yet, despite these challenges and several others, head coach John Pagano is remarkably upbeat.
"We have a lot of very good young players," Pagano said. "We lost some great kids, but we just have to work through it and build with the guys we have. They are working hard and we feel good about the program."
Huntington has a talented core group of players, including Ari Moskowitz in goal and Grixon Moriera at midfield. All-League junior Jeremy Gelb has moved from defense to midfield. Sophomores Josh Canales and Wilson Sanchez should also be key players for the squad.
While Pagano is optimistic about the season and feels the roster includes many good young players, it will be hard to replace the loss of Ricky Velasquez, who led the Blue Devils with 21 goals last fall.
Velasquez, who was named All-Conference and was one of Suffolk's top goal scorers in 2011, was expected to star for Huntington for the next two years. But, he moved to Nassau and left a large hole on the team that needs to be filled.
Huntington also lost several exceptional seniors, including Adil Gowani (All-Conference), Jonathan Pena (All-League), Andone Pleitez (All-League) and Norman Gomez-Vasquez (Academic All-County).
The Blue Devils dropped the season opener last Friday at home as Sayville bested Huntington, 2-0. Moskowitz recorded four saves and teammate Lee Reiver stopped two shots.