Leading off today: Curt Fischer is out and Bryan Bongiovanni is in as the football coach in the second year of the
Chautauqua Lake/Westfield combined football program.
Bongiovanni was appointed Wednesday night during a school board meeting five days ahead of the start of practice. He has coached baseball at Chautauqua Lake the past two seasons.
Fischer was 4-4 in his one season at Chautauqua Lake/Westfield. The two-time NYSPHSAA championship coach has a 225-49 record overall in 26 seasons, with the first 25 years at Maple Grove. Fischer told The Buffalo News he was informed the school "wanted to go in a different direction." He declined further comment.
With Chautauqua Lake having been combined with Maple Grove prior to joining forces with Westfield, athletes in that program will be playing under their fourth head coach in four years.
• Tyree Parker has been promoted to head football coach for the Western New York Maritime/Health Sciences combined team as Charlie Comerford switches to assistant coach in order to be able to focus more on his duties as AD at Maritime.
Parker coached Health Sciences to back-to-back state Class B semifinals in boys basketball in 2017 and 2018.
Maritime/Health Sciences was 2-6 last fall in its inaugural season.
More football: We've uploaded the week-by-week schedule for the 2019 season to our RoadToSyracuse.com website.
More appointments: With Bill Pilla having moved on to Tappan Zee, boys soccer coach Ryan Marcus is the new athletic coordinator at Spring Valley.
Marcus, 37, will remain on the soccer sideline this fall.
"All the passion I have for the soccer program will be there for the entire athletic program," he said. "I'd like to replicate what I've done with that program throughout the entire athletic program."
• Second-year varsity assistant Leah Tuck has been promoted to girls lacrosse coach at Fayetteville-Manlius. She played on F-M's first state championship team in the sport in 2004.
On the move: Third-team all-state selection Pierce Prendergast won't be returning the basketball program at Class A Bayport-Blue Point this year, instead enrolling at Loomis Chaffee School in Connecticut and stepping up to NEPSAC competition.
Two of Prendergast's older brothers made similar moves in the past.
"Them recommending it to me really influenced my ultimate decision," Prendergast said. "They talked about all the opportunities it can bring and brought for them and how it's just way better basketball wise and academically."
