The Williston Park baseball season ended with a championship win, dedicated to Williston Park Little League and travel team player Rayan Abdolahzadi, who died in a motorcycle accident earlier this year.
The Williston Park Patriots College baseball team won their championship game at Half Hollows, wearing “AB” on their jerseys in honor of Abdolahzadi. The game, which took place Aug. 3, was their second championship win within the past three years. The team finished first this season and defeated the Huntington Demons in the championship game 3-2.
Baseball player Emmett O’Brien had a two-run single, which tied the game at 2-2 after the first inning. Alex Marcoline pitched six innings and Patrick Gay pitched the seventh inning. Right fielder Malachy O’Brien threw out a runner at home and then another runner at third.
In the last inning, Conor Martin walked and then stole second. He advanced to third on an infield hit by Matt Bravo. With two outs, Luke Sommese hit a ball that stayed in the infield, and he was quick enough to reach first base safely before the fielders could make the play to get him out. While this was happening, Conor Martin scored the winning run.
“We have about 15 kids on the team, but most of these kids start in the Williston Park Little League,” Bill O’Brien, co-coach for The Williston Park Patriots College baseball team, said. “We kept it going when they aged out of Little League. We kept the travel team going so they have been playing on this team since they’ve been in seventh grade and now they’re all in college.”
O’Brien said the team grew up playing with Abdolahzadi until a couple years ago when he stopped playing baseball. He said Abdolahzadi was very friendly with all of his teammates, a hard worker and very supportive.
“Everyone who really knew Rayan loved him as a friend and it was just very sad to get the news when somebody that young passes away,” O’Brien said. “Especially somebody that a lot of people were close with or had known him for such a long period of time.”
Some of the players who knew Abdolahzadi were the core group of about nine players who have been with the team since the beginning. O’Brien said some players dropped out while some players have been added, so there have been different variations of the team throughout the years.
The team plays every summer in Dix Hills in the college division. The athletes range from 19 to 22 years old.
“We won the championship in 2022 and we lost in 2023 and then we won again this year,” O’Brien said.
The team finished first in the division for the summer so O’Brien said competing in the championship game was expected. The Huntington Demons was half a game behind the Williston team. He said the team knew that the championship game was going to be very close.
“The dedication that all these kids have, they know what their role is on the team and they play as a team,” O’Brien said when asked what contributed to this win. “Nobody’s trying to be the one person above anyone else. They’re all very supportive of each other.”
“I’m sure he (Abdolahzadi) had a little bit of help with us from above,” O’Brien said.
O’Brien said he plans to continue winning future championships. He said the current players have a couple of more years until they age out of this division.
