The 2024 high school season was one for the ages for the South Side Cyclones, going 21-1 and winning their first state championship in 20 years with some improbable comeback wins in the playoffs that makes their run so memorable. After knocking on the door the past few years of coming out of Nassau County, the 2024 team which had 27 seniors on it came together and created a historic season which included them winning their final 15 games of season to go the distance. At the helm for the Cyclones is Head Coach Steve DiPietro who was an assistant coach the last time the Cyclones were state champions back in 2004, and won his first state championship as head coach.
Throughout the season the program saw multiple milestones reached both individually and as a team, including defeating both Garden City and Manhasset, two storied programs in the same season for the first time in their history. Coach DiPietro talked about how the level of competition that they played throughout Nassau County helped shape them going into the playoffs.
“Nassau County has some of the best lacrosse in the country and the league that we were in was probably one of the top leagues in the country, and for our guys I think they really approached every game as a game by game type of season. Everyone that’s in the power league we have a history with, and each one of those wins gave us a little more confidence and showed areas that we needed to work on in some circumstances and I think it absolutely battle tested us.”
In the postseason their run included wins against Long Beach and Carey in the first two rounds which set up another matchup against Manhasset in the county final where they came away with a 12-10 win to advance to the Long Island Championship. In the LIC it was a rematch from last fall’s football LIC against East Islip where this time South Side came out on top 12-9 to win the Class B Long Island Championship.
“All of our guys were certainly fired up for that game and to be able to avenge that loss on the other side of things, it was just a tremendous game by both teams.”
After defeating Warwick Valley High School in the regional semifinals, the Cyclones faced Yorktown in the state semifinals at SUNY Albany where they became the comeback kids. They faced a five goal deficit in the third quarter, trailing 7-2 and went on to outscore them 8-1 the remainder of the game for a 10-8 win. Despite the deficit, coach DiPietro didn’t lose faith and believed that they were playing well, but were just unable to capitalize due to great goaltending from Yorktown’s Hunter Mezzatesta.
“All the coaching staff really tried to tell them at that point when it was 7-2 with 1:54 left in the third was just about grinding it out and little plays leading to big plays. I really didn’t think we weren’t playing poorly, I thought their goalie was outstanding. We had good movement and we had good opportunities and their goalie was coming up with some huge saves.”
After completing the comeback against Yorktown, they advanced to their first state championship game since 2004 to face Victor who was playing in their third consecutive state title game, and they were once again looking at a five goal deficit in the second half before rallying back to take a 10-9 lead courtesy of Cole DiPietro. After Victor responded and led by one with 14 seconds remaining, Michael Aiello’s memorable dive to the cage with .8 seconds on the clock tied the game at 11 to send it to overtime where the Hollywood ending was completed as it was DiPietro scoring the winning goal after a vital opening face-off win by Michael Melkonian to cap off a dream season that will be remembered for years to come.
“It was just an overwhelming feeling on every level, as a coach, as a father, for the program, the team, the alumni, for the community, just all those years of being so close, and having been part of the ’04 championship and experiencing that as an assistant, just relief and overwhelming happiness.”
