Many fine young athletes have excelled this season and were chosen by the Oyster Bay High School coaches as Athletes of the Month for May.
Badminton coach Greg Bilello chose Courtney Kowalsky as the athlete of the month.
“Courtney plays first singles for the varsity badminton team. This season she was undefeated in league play at 13-0,” Bilello said. “In the Nassau County singles championship tournament she earned all-county honors, defeating three opponents to reach the county finals. Her final season record was 17-1 for 2015.”
The head coach of the Oyster Bay High School varsity baseball team is Jay Davis. Often Coach Davis is lauded as “Coach of the Year” for coaching baseball and wrestling. On May 11, Davis added to his list of tremendous accomplishments. On that day, Davis logged his 400th win as coach of the OBHS varsity baseball team. His choice for Athlete of Month certainly aided in racking up many of those wins.
“Oyster Bay varsity baseball’s returning all-county pitcher Stephen Spiegel is four and one this season, with a 1.28 ERA,” said Davis. “He has struck out 65 batters in 35 innings pitched. Opponents are batting just .138 against him and his WHIP is 1.11. Stephen is a major reason why the varsity baseball team has once again qualified for post-season play. His last regular season start was a gem verse the team Oyster Bay faced in the county finals last season, Wheatley. Stephen had a complete game shutout, not allowing a hit until the sixth inning while striking out 12.”
Girls lacrosse head coach Charlie Rizzuto is passionate about his job and his teams. That passion is apparent when he talks about his players.
“Leadership is displayed in many different ways, and these three girls deserve recognition for setting a positive example of what leadership looks like,” said Rizzuto. “The best example of the way Grace Wygand, Nicki Stanco and Nicole Hauser lead our team happened in our last regular season game. In a close contest, Grace took on the role of coach on the field, making sure her teammates knew exactly where they needed to be at all times. Even from the sideline, she could be heard yelling to each one of her teammates, explaining where they need to go and even what they need to say. Nicki came out of the game at the beginning of the second half with a sore leg, but with a few minutes on the clock and her team needing a defensive stop, she asked to go back in and was part of a defensive unit that created a turnover with only seconds remaining that lead to the winning goal. Nicole has been a clutch goal scorer for our program from year one, scoring more game winning goals than any other player and that continued against MacArthur. Nicole scored the game winning goal as the horn sounded, winning the game and securing Oyster Bay the two seed in the playoffs.”
