Thursday, Oct. 22, 2015: Schenevus ends dry spell in soccer sectionals

   Leading off today: None of the players on the Schenevus boys soccer team were of school age the last time that program won a Section 4 playoff game.

   The dry spell ended Wednesday when the 11th-seeded Dragons upset sixth-seeded Laurens 1-0 in the first round of the sectional Class D tournament. Dominic Hanus converted a pass from Corey Roseboom for the goal with 1:54 remaining in the second half, ending a run of 14 seasons without a playoff victory.

   "It was a great shot from Dominic," Schenevus coach Jim Huntington told The Daily Star. "Their goalie made some great saves. This one just got away from him."

   Kyle Darling made three saves for the Dragons, who outshot Laurens 16-5.

   Record-setter: Madisyn Pezzino scored three goals for Grand Island, the state's fifth-ranked Class A team, in a 7-0 victory vs. Cheektowaga in the Section 6 girls soccer tournament.

   The hat trick brought her career total to 170 goals, breaking the school record of 168 by 2006 graduate Jessica Remmes. Pezzino has 45 goals and nine assists this season.

   Former POY dies: There was stunning news out of Greenville, S.C., Wednesday that former Batavia Notre Dame girls basketball star Christina Volpe had died of cardiac arrest at her home. She was 34.

   Volpe was the state Class D player of the year in 1999 after leading the Fighting Irish to the state and Federation Class D championships. The 5-foot-10 forward remains in the top 30 of the state's career scoring list with 2,392 points.

   "It's a tremendously sad loss. And just shocking," said Bill Wade, who coached Volpe at Notre Dame. "It's just knocked us all for a loop because she meant so much to us. I love her and her family, John and Margaret, are such great parents. They were really supportive of her and all their kids and Chrissy loved her family and she loved her friends but she really loved living. She had a lot of fun. She had a laugh -- it was loud and booming and it was genuine."

   Volpe averaged 23.2 points per game for her career, including 23.5 points and 15.8 rebounds per game during the championship season.

   "If it was a big game, she brought it," Wade. told The Daily News in Batavia. "She had a refuse-to-lose attitude.

RoadToSyracuse.com football site

You can't teach that and you can't coach that, you're just lucky when you get a player like that and she had that."

   Schedules updated: Steve Grandin has gathered the sectional playoff matchups and updated our Week 8 football schedule. You can also check out the rundown of opponents for teams ranked this week by the New York State Sportswriters Association.

   Another week off: Pardon the old-guy reference, but you can excuse the Dobbs Ferry football team if they think the Maytag repairman's schedule is too busy.

   Dobbs Ferry, ranked third in the state in Class C this week (full rankings here) with a 6-0 record, had a bye last weekend to close out the regular season and won't play again until it faces Rye Neck or Woodlands on Oct. 31 in the Section 1 championship game. That makes for a 22-day layoff heading into the most important stretch of the season.

   Both last week and this week, coach Jim Moran arranged midweek practices against other teams, The Journal News reported. "It's just to avoid the boredom," he said. "How many times can you hit your best friend?"

   The stretch of taking weekends off from game action was partly the school's own doing. Moran and his coaches decided against trying to schedule a seventh game -- not surprising since there weren't a lot of great option.

   The extra week off figures to help. Quarterback/safety Chris Cipriano suffered a broken collarbone on Sept. 19 against Woodlands and has been out since. Moran moved Ted Annunziato to quarterback, only to see the senior suffer a concussion against Tuckahoe. Annunziato still needs to pass his concussion protocols next week to resume action, so the playoff bye is definitely a blessing in that respect.

   And store this away for future reference: The winner of the Oct. 31 championship game gets the following weekend off since the Nov. 6-8 block on the schedule is reserved for sectional finals across most of the rest of the state.