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| Photo Credit: Massapequa Patch |
Playing for Massapequa isn’t always easy. After all, you are basically expected to continue the winning tradition that has been in place for decades. This year, however, the football and the basketball team came up just shy of the ultimate goal. Alex Cosenza, who was also a pivotal part of the basketball team, made sure the baseball team would not follow suit. In fact, he has now led the Chiefs to consecutive Nassau County AA title on the diamond.
“Winning back-to-back county titles is one of the best feelings in the world,” said the All-State left-handed pitcher. “Especially because of all the work we put in as a team. It feels good when it pays off,” he added.
That is spoken like somebody who is accustomed to winning. Massapequa is fresh off defeating Oceanside in both games of a best-of-three county finals at SUNY Farmingdale. The Chiefs actually entered the tournament as somewhat of an underdog, as they were No. 6 based on a sub-par regular season by their standards. Their veteran players stepped up, though, and performed at their best when it mattered. Cosenza, one those those aforementioned veterans, recorded the victory in the first game, a 3-2 defeat.
Cosenza is the definition of an ace. He has been the workhorse for the Chiefs for a couple of years and has a calm demeanor on the mound.
“The expectations are always high here at Massapequa,” he said. “The goal is always to win a county title. “I don’t necessarily feel pressure because of the way Coach Sheedy and Coach Cafiero prepare us each day through out the season. Everyone was always on the same page and when that happens, goals seem to be much more attainable”, he added.
The next step is to win the Long Island Championship. Cosenza will most likely be the starting pitcher, as he was last year at Dowling College against Ward Melville. He pitched a tremendous game, but the Chiefs lost a heartbreaking 1-0 game to Suffolk County’s elite team–Ward Melville.
In front of a fully packed bleachers–close to 1,000 spectators–Cosenza performed like a grizzled veteran, something not often seen by a junior in high school.
“It is very special pitching in a championship game,” he said. “I always try to stay relaxed and trust myself, my catcher and my defense behind me. I try to treat it like any other start I’ve made”.
That, of course, is easier said than done. It takes a certain type of pitcher to mitigate the electric atmosphere. Two pitchers that come to mind happen to be personal favorites of Cosenza–Tom Glavine and Greg Maddux
Glavine, a recent inductee into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, won 305 games in his career with a 3.54 ERA. That is not including his 14 postseason wins that came with a 3.30 ERA. The left-handed pitcher was notorious for his bend-but-don’t-break tactic of pitching and his propensity to get out of tough jams without yielding a run.
Maddux, also a Hall of Famer, had an even better career. He won 355 games with a 3.16 ERA and 1.14 WHIP. He won the National League Cy Young Award every year from 1992-’95, an unprecedented four year stretch of dominance. While Glavine performed Houdini acts to avoid trouble, Maddux simply avoided allowing base runners.
While they both had tremendous careers, neither of them featured elite velocity but they relied on pinpoint control and a chemist-level of concentration.
“I try to model their pitching approaches and styles,” he said.
For the comparisons to have any chance of becoming legitimate, Cosenza must prosper at the next level. That will begin in the fall while pitching for Division-I Hofstra. The Pride is coming off an underwhelming 20-24 season, but they have a young core in place that will enable them to contend this season.
“As much as I am taking in every day I have left playing as a Chief, I’m looking forward to starting the next chapter of my life at Hofstra,” he said.
It certainly won’t be a cake walk transitioning from facing the best that Nassau County high schools have to offer to taking on the best hitters in the Colonial Athletic Association.
“The biggest challenge will be adjusting to the very talented hitters at that level and finding a way to get them out,” said Cosenza.
Judging by his track record, that should not be an issue.
In the meantime, Cosenza is focusing on finishing what he set out to accomplish at Massapequa–and that’s to bring home a Long Island Championship for the first time since 2009.
