Voters will choose between Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) and U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY1) for governor in the November gubernatorial election. Photos from candidates’ offices
Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) and U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY1) each won their party’s primary election on Tuesday, June 28, setting the stage for the gubernatorial election this November.
Hochul won her race handily, winning every county in the state. She became the first female candidate to win the Democratic nomination for governor.
“I stand on the shoulders of generations of women, generations of women who constantly had to bang up against that class ceiling,” the governor said. “To the women of New York, this one’s for you.”
Hochul bested New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams and Long Island native Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY3). Along with his unsuccessful bid for governor, Suozzi vacated his seat in Congress, triggering a primary election to fill that seat which will be held Aug. 23.
Suozzi was not the only Long Islander in the running for governor. On the Republican side, Lee Zeldin, of Shirley, beat out three other Republican candidates, including Andrew Giuliani, carrying 43.9% of the vote statewide with over 95% reported.
In his victory speech, Zeldin said, “I commend all of the candidates in this primary for running a hard-fought race and look forward to working together to fire Kathy Hochul and save our state. This is a rescue mission to end the attacks on our safety, wallets, freedoms and kids’ education. Losing is not an option.”
Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado (D) also won his race and will run alongside Hochul throughout this election cycle.
In the legislative race, two Republican candidates — Edward Flood and Thomas Wiermann — competed for their party’s nomination in the 4th Assembly District. Flood, a narrow winner unofficially by 2,491 votes to 2,375, will take on state Assemblyman Steve Englebright (D-Setauket) this November in the general election.
At the county level, Republican Vincent Puleo, town clerk of Smithtown, defeated incumbent Suffolk County Clerk Judith Pascale, who has served in that position since 2006. Puleo received 60% of votes in the primary election.
Members of the CanCan team, from left,Oliver Maddocks, David Lewis, Johan Vande Voorde, Bette Caan, Marcus Goncalves, Eileen White, Mariam Jamal-Hanjani, Tobias Janowitz, Karen Mustian, Janelle Ayres andToni Hui
By Daniel Dunaief
If a team Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Assistant Professor Tobias Janowitz co-leads succeeds, researchers will know more about the end stage of numerous types of cancer that involves the loss of tissue and muscle mass.
Tobias Janowitz
Recently, lead scientists Janowitz; Eileen White, Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey Deputy Director and Chief Scientific Officer; and Dr. Marcus DaSilva Goncalves, Assistant Professor of Medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine received $25 million in funding as a part of a Cancer Grand Challenge, which is a combined trans-Atlantic funding effort between Cancer Research UK and the National Cancer Institute in the United States.
The cachexia group was one of four teams to receive funding among 11 finalists.
Bruce Stillman, president of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, described cachexia as “one of the most difficult clinical problems with late stage cancer.”
Stillman added that the collaboration is promising because it brings together a group of “remarkable” scientists, including White, who was a postdoctoral fellow in Stillman’s lab. “It has great potential for making a difference in the lives of patients.”
Stillman believes Janowitz is an ideal co leader for this challenging project because he has an MD and a PhD and is clinically certified as an oncologist.
CanCan team
For his part, Janowitz is looking forward to the opportunity to team up with other ambitious research efforts to create a virtual institute.
Eileen White
“It’s incredibly exciting to get the chance to do something you think is higher risk with a large group of people who have come together around this problem,” said Janowitz. “We often talked about how it would be nice to bring team members from other disciplines into this area.”
Indeed, the cachexia team, which White named CanCan for Cancer Cachexia Action Network believes cachexia is a tumor-driven metabolic imbalance. The group is pursuing different areas of research, including metabolism, neuroendocrinology, clinical research, and immunology, among others, to define clinical subtypes with the hopes of creating individualized therapies.
While the effort brings together a range of scientists with different expertise and technological skills, researchers don’t expect an immediate therapeutic solution within that time frame. Rather, they anticipate that their experiments and clinical data will help inform future approaches that could enhance efforts to prevent and treat a wasting disease that causes severe declines in a patient’s quality of life.
“What we would deem as a success is, if in five years time, we have maybe one to three strong lead hypotheses that comes out of our shared work on how we can either prevent or treat cachexia as it emerges,” Janowitz said.
The complexity of cachexia
Dr. Marcus DaSilva Goncalves
As a complex process that involves an understanding of numerous interconnected dynamics, cachexia has been a challenging field for researchers and a difficult one for funding agencies looking for discrete problems with definable results and solutions.
Cachexia research had “never reached this critical mass that people were seeing where we can say, ‘Okay, there’s enough work going on to really unravel this,’” Janowitz said.
The CanCan team has several scientific themes. Janowitz will be involved with metabolic dysregulation. He would like to understand the behavioral changes around appetite and food intake.
Additionally, the group will explore the interaction of normal cells and cancer cells by looking at the tumor micro environment. This research will explore how cancer cells can reprogram healthy host cells.
“We’ve got a really exciting axis of research” within the network, Janowitz said.
Searching for signaling molecules
Janowitz said Norbert Perrimon, James Stillman Professor of Developmental Biology at Harvard Medical School is one of the leading experts in fly genetics and fly biology. Perrimon has created a model of cachexia in the fruit fly. While that sounds far from patients, Perrimon can use single molecule resolution of the entire organism to get an insight and understanding of candidate molecules.
“We are hoping to search for new signaling molecules that might get involved” in cachexia, Janowitz said. Once the research finds new candidates, he and others can validate whether they also work in mouse models of cancer and cancer cachexia.
With numerous clinical groups, Janowitz hopes to contribute to the design and execution of experimental medicine studies.
The Cancer Grand Challenge will distribute the funds based on what members need. Janowitz described the allocation of funds as “roughly equitable.” He will use that funding to support a postdoctoral researcher, a PhD student and a technician, who can help with specific projects he’s merging in his lab to combine with the team effort.
The funds will also support his salary so he can supervise the work in his lab and help with the coordination of this effort.
The funding agencies have an additional budget to organize conferences and meetings, where researchers can discuss ideas in person and can ensure that any clinical and laboratory work is standardized and reproducible in different facilities.
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory will host the first full gathering of the cachexia team in November.
Challenging beginnings
When he was a doctor in the United Kingdom, Janowitz was fascinated and confounded by cachexia. In the early years of his training, he saw patients who had a small tumor burden, but were so sick that they died. Those experiences made “such a strong imprint” that he wanted to help unravel this process as a junior oncologist, he said.
Getting funding was challenging because cachexia was complex and didn’t involve a finely defined project that linked a receptor protein to a cell type that led to a diseased condition.
Janowitz, among others in this field, felt passionate enough about this area to continue to search for information about cachexia. After he restructured his research into a narrower focus, he secured more funding.
An unsolved mystery
With enough researchers continuing along this path, Janowitz said the group developed an awareness that this is “one of the big, unsolved mysteries of cancer progression.”
Janowitz appreciates the opportunity to work with a team that has accomplished researchers who work in fields that are related or synergistic, but aren’t necessarily considered part of the cachexia field.
The significant funding comes with expectations.
“The grant is both a great joy, but also, essentially, a mandate of duty,” he said. “Now, you have to utilize this grant to make significant contributions to understand and hopefully treat this debilitating condition.”
Krupski Farm has been acquired by Del Vino Vineyards.
Northport-based Del Vino Vineyards provides an expanded estate growing footprint in Riverhead, and opportunity for more grape growing and a new tasting room location.
Del Vino Vineyards announced today that they have closed on the purchase of the Krupski Farm, a 30-acre property of pastureland land which is agriculturally preserved that will be converted to vineyards in Riverhead.
The property, nestled between Sound Avenue and Northville Turnpike in Riverhead, has been owned by prominent local farmers since 1966.
Krupski Farm has been acquired by Del Vino Vineyards.
This purchase adds valuable acres to Del Vino Vineyards winegrowing footprint in the Long Island region, which aligns with one of the company’s long-term strategies of becoming more vertically integrated by farming more fruit from their own vineyards. Del Vino Vineyards in Northport, located on 12 acres, is currently home to 7 varieties of grapes. In addition to the farming land, Del Vino Vineyards plans to operate as a new tasting room destination, likely opening sometime in 2024.
“We believe in building a wine company that invests back into the community and the industry that it’s a part of. Bringing the Krupski Family Farm into our portfolio shifts us towards having the majority of our production coming from our own vineyards, which is a huge part of our long-term vision,” said Fred Giachetti, Owner of Del Vino Vineyards. “The vineyard management team at Del Vino Vineyards has done an exceptional job of maintaining an eye on quality, and we’re incredibly excited about our expansion.”
Lisa Giachetti, Del Vino Vineyards owner commented further, “the Krupski Farm presents an opportunity for us to serve our existing fans in a new location, but it will also allow us to attract and engage new customers in the Long Island Wine Country region, which is an exciting proposition. We’re thrilled to be growing our Del Vino vineyard acreage and our staff with this acquisition.”
To learn more about Del Vino Vineyards, please visit www.delvinovineyards.com and follow us on Facebook and Instagram @delvinovineyards
We don’t usually go to bed thinking, “what if I’m wrong?” We don’t get up asking ourselves the same question.
We develop our beliefs, stick with them and, as time goes on, we defend them or push for change based on something we think, or are fairly certain, we know.
But it’s worth considering the possibility that we might be wrong, particularly in connection with something as important as the only habitable planet we know.
If you don’t believe climate change is a threat and you think rules restricting environmental pollution are unnecessary and a federal government overreach, have you considered the consequences of being wrong?
I won’t trot out all the climate science experts who have what they consider incontrovertible proof that the climate is warming based on years of data.
You’d probably come back with the argument that the data can be interpreted in other ways or that science itself rarely has complete certainty.
You might even suggest that a warmer climate would mean we wouldn’t need to use as much heat during the winter months and that some crops might grow better during a longer, hotter growing season.
While I don’t ascribe to those thoughts —which a headline grabbing Republican recently espoused — because of the danger to so many staple crops from a warmer season that could include droughts and storms that cripple cities and destroy crops, I want those who don’t believe climate change is real to consider what might happen if they are wrong.
At the time of this writing, the Supreme Court hadn’t ruled on West Virginia vs. Environmental Protection Agency. If the conservative majority, who have been reshaping the political and legal landscape at a rapid pace, rules as expected, the EPA will have less authority to regulate power plant pollution.
That would mean power plants won’t have to comply with federal rules that limit the gases they emit into the environment and the pollutants they send into the air.
These companies may be able to make more money by continuing to operate as they had in the past. Yay for them? Right? Well, not so fast.
What’s the risk if they are wrong? We all make decisions when weighing risks, whether it’s the types of stocks we invest in, the places we go that might be dangerous at night, or the undercooked foods we eat.
So, if they’re wrong, the world continues to heat up, storms such as hurricanes move more slowly, dumping more rain on any one area, crops get destroyed, glaciers continue to melt causing sea levels to rise, and biodiversity declines, wiping out species that might have otherwise led to cures for disease or provide future food sources.
Some areas also become uninhabitable.
Our children, grandchildren and future generations can’t come back to tell us who was right. What we do or don’t do, however, will undoubtedly affect them.
Using the same logic climate change deniers use to suggest that nothing is certain, it seems critical to hedge their bets, protecting us from a future they believe is possible but unlikely.
Even if the Supreme Court acts (or acted, depending on the timing) as expected, we don’t have to be fatalistic or cynical about the next steps in the battle against our own gaseous waste.
Utilities and other companies that produce these gases have to take responsibility for their actions, regardless of what the Supreme Court says or does. Even reluctant legislators have to consider what might happen if they are wrong. Yes, leaders have numerous other problems.
We can’t ignore the Earth. If some people consider the consequences of freeing up companies to send carbon dioxide into the only air we have, they might be making a one-way mistake. They must consider what will happen if they are wrong.
Women need some good news right about now, after the Roe decision, and here it is: Women are more likely to live past 90. But there is a caveat. We have to be optimistic. Now, don’t poo poo this statement. It comes from a large study by researchers at Harvard University and was published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.
Entitled, “Optimism, Lifestyle and Longevity in a Racially Diverse Cohort of Women,” the study deals with 26 years of data from almost 160,000 women between the ages of 50 and 79. All the participants were selected for their optimism with quantitative measures of testing. Researchers found that the top quarter of the women in the study with the most positive outlook would probably live 5.4% longer than the least optimistic 25% of participants. Further, the more optimistic women were 10% more likely to live past the age of 90 than the least optimistic cohort.
The link between optimism and longer lifespan could be seen across racial and ethnic groups. “Optimism may be an important asset to consider for promoting health and longevity in diverse populations,” states the article. Non-Hispanic White, Black, Hispanic/Latina and Asian, American Indian and Alaskan native women were in the group.
“A high proportion (53%) of the women [in the optimism group] achieved exceptional longevity,” according to the study. “Higher optimism was associated with longer lifespan and a greater likelihood of achieving exceptional longevity overall and across racial and ethnic groups. The contribution of lifestyle to these associations was modest. Optimism may promote health and longevity in diverse ethnic and racial groups. Future research should investigate these associations in less long-lived populations,” concludes the Journal. Francine Grodstein, ScD and Laura D. Kubzansky, PhD, were the principal researchers of the study.
Interestingly, of those tested, women with higher optimism levels were more frequently non-Hispanic White with higher education levels.
This study also suggests that optimism is “just as important as exercise when it comes to longevity.” The researchers found this to be true even when other factors like depression, chronic health conditions and racial, social and economic background were taken into account. So a positive outlook on life may be just as important as fitness—or so lazy optimists would like to believe, and based on this large study, they may be right.
Stress, on the other hand, can take a toll on mental and physical health. According to an article in this past Tuesday’s New York Times, “certain types of stress can even age your immune system.”In a study involving 5700 adults aged 50 and over, stresses like job strain, stressful life events, every day or lifetime discrimination (including sexism or ageism) and traumatic life events were cross referenced with immune cell counts from participants’ blood. Simple aging is also a stress on the immune system.
One way to prevent or minimize immune cell aging may be to minimize or do away with unhealthy habits like smoking and drinking. But all kinds of stress, we intuitively know, can effect physical health.
How do we help ourselves further reduce stress?
Taking stock of our emotions is a good place to start. Knowing and acting on what brings us joy and where we can find social support can help. “That may mean pursuing hobbies, spending time with loved ones, or unplugging from work or social media when you can,” suggests Hannah Seo, writing for the NYT. “Mindfulness practices, exercise and healthy eating habits can also help you feel good physically, which in turn can make you feel good mentally,” according to Renee Eddy, a New York City psychotherapist, quoted in the NYT.
My best defense against stress is having social support from family and friends. My son, daughter-in-law and grandson recently visited for four days, and just interacting with them was a joy. My friends call and just chatting leaves me feeling happy, not to mention more informed.
Stresses can negatively affect longevity. Joy and optimism, we are told by current research, can increase lifespan.
Suffolk County Police have arrested a Huntington man for allegedly spray painting a political sign with a swastika.
A swastika, “187,” and the word “Gambino,” were found painted onto a Lee Zeldin campaign sign, located on the corner of West Pulaski Road and Oakwood Road in Huntington Station, on June 26 at approximately 10:05 a.m.
After an investigation, Hate Crimes Unit detectives arrested Vincent J. Mckie outside his home on Oakwood Road on June 28 at 12:25 p.m..
Mckie, 41, was charged with Aggravated Harassment 1st Degree, a hate crime, and Criminal Mischief 4th Degree. He will be arraigned at First District Court in Central Islip on a later date.
A criminal charge is an accusation. A defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty.
Dr. Gregson Pigott, Commissioner of the Suffolk County Department of Health Services, said that due to the heavy rainfall that occurred recently, the Suffolk County Department of Health Services has issued an advisory against bathing at 63 beaches, including beaches within and adjacent to various north shore embayments (Cold Spring Harbor, Huntington Harbor and Bay, Centerport Harbor, Northport Harbor and Bay, Port Jefferson Harbor Complex, and Stony Brook Harbor), along the northern shoreline of the Great South Bay, Sag Harbor, and those Long Island Sound beaches that are directly impacted by nearby storm water discharges (list attached).
The advisory is based on the potential that bacterial numbers in excess of New York State standards, resulting from the heavy rain, will impact these areas.
The beaches covered by the advisory are located in areas that are heavily influenced by stormwater runoff from the surrounding watersheds and/or adjacent tributaries, and, because of their location in an enclosed embayment, experience limited tidal flushing.
The Department recommends that bathing and other water contact be suspended in affected areas until the waters have been flushed by two successive tidal cycles (at least a 24 hr. period) after the rain has ended. Unless sampling done by the Department finds elevated bacterial numbers persisting beyond the 24-hr period, this advisory will be lifted Wednesday, 6/29/22 7am.
For the latest information on affected beaches, call the Bathing Beach HOTLINE at 631-852-5822, contact the Department’s Office of Ecology at 631-852-5760 M-F, or visit the website link: www.suffolkcountyny.gov/health.
Proud family members and invited guests gathered at Cold Spring Harbor High School on June 12 to join in celebrating the 59th Commencement of the 145 graduating seniors of the Class of 2022. As the graduates processed into the field house for the final time, High School Principal Daniel Danbusky congratulated the class on their dedication and commitment to achieving their goal of academic success.
“We are all gathered here to recognize and celebrate your accomplishments,” he said.
—Photos from Cold Spring Harbor Central School District
How changing political boundaries can have real consequences for voters and their representatives
An early political cartoon criticizing former Massachusetts Gov. Elbridge Gerry’s practice of drawing bizarrely shaped state senate districts for partisan gain. Stock photo by Pixy
Redistricting is shaking up this election season.
Redistricting is the process by which new political boundaries are drawn to reflect the changes in populations across regions and states. New congressional districts, as well as state Senate and Assembly districts, are redrawn by state Legislatures every 10 years to accord with the most recent U.S. Census results.
‘Government at its worst.’
— Mario Mattera
This year, a cloud of uncertainty was placed over the electoral process when the state Court of Appeals blocked the New York State Legislature’s plans for redrawn district maps. The majority 4-3 decision sent the responsibility for redrawing the lines to an out-of-state independent commission.
State Sen. Mario Mattera (R-St. James), whose District 2 was altered significantly under the new lines, accused the majority in the state Legislature of attempting to gerrymander his district.
“What happened was — and I’m going to say this — the Democrats went in and gerrymandered the lines in the Senate and the congressional lines,” he said.
Unlike the district lines for the state Assembly, which Mattera suggested were worked out through a series of compromises between party leaders, the state Senate could not find a working agreement for new lines. The state senator also said that the lines could have been revised before they went to court, but the majority objected, hoping to win a favorable opinion for its unfair district maps.
“The judges ruled it gerrymandering, so it went to an outside commission called Special Masters, out of Pennsylvania, and it cost the taxpayers money to do this,” he said.
Mattera expressed frustration at the process, which he said wasted time and taxpayer dollars unnecessarily. He called the recent redistricting process “government at its worst.”
‘I’m never disappointed when the process is done fairly and when it’s done by a bipartisan group that is drawing the lines.’ — Jodi Giglio
New boundaries, altered communities
Under the new district maps, people in communities throughout Long Island will see major changes this year in their political representation. Mattera, whose district currently includes Setauket, Stony Brook and Old Field, will no longer represent those areas after this year.
“Even though, as a Republican, I wasn’t getting the best results out of Setauket and Stony Brook, I still loved my district,” he said. “I did very well in knowing the people and getting to know everybody, and now I’ve lost all of the Township of Brookhaven.”
Mattera is not alone in losing a significant portion of his current constituency. State leaders all across the Island have had their district lines redrawn as well.
“Southold in its entirety has been taken away from Assembly District 2 and has been placed in Assembly District 1,” said state Assemblywoman Jodi Giglio (R-Riverhead), who represents the 2nd District.
Despite losing Southold, Giglio is not disappointed by the changes in her district. She considered the redrawing of the Assembly lines a product of bipartisan negotiations and was glad to pick up new constituencies elsewhere.
“I’m never disappointed when the process is done fairly and when it’s done by a bipartisan group that is drawing the lines,” she said, adding, “I was pleased to pick up many people in the 2nd Assembly District and will continue to work for the people of Southold as I have grown very close to them.”
‘It’s a fact of life.’
— Helmut Norpoth
Redistricting, past and future
Helmut Norpoth, professor in the Department of Political Science at Stony Brook University, detailed the long history of partisan squabbles over district lines. He said gerrymandering has existed since at least the early 19th century.
The word “gerrymander” was created after the infamous Massachusetts Gov. Elbridge Gerry, a Founding Father and later vice president who first employed the tactic to create bizarrely shaped state senate districts. Norpoth said gerrymandering has been around “forever” and that “it’s a fact of life” whenever district maps are redrawn.
Norpoth and two of his students recently submitted a proposal to the New York State Independent Redistricting Commission. Their work is centered around making district maps fairer and elections more competitive.
“One of the requirements that we followed in our proposal is to keep communities intact and minimize any splitting of a natural community into different districts,” Norpoth said. Districts “have to be contiguous, they have to be compact. They have to be as competitive as possible, so that the balance can give both parties a chance.” He added, “There are so many different angles that you have to abide by. It’s sort of a magic act to put it all together.”
‘It’s becoming clear that it’s easier to draw unfair districts.’ — Robert Kelly
While there are so many variables considered while drawing district lines, supercomputing may help to speed up and simplify the process. Robert Kelly, professor in the Department of Computer Science at SBU, focuses on automated redistricting, which uses a mathematical formulation to generate district lines based on a wide range of constraints.
“That allows us to look at, for a given state, what the constraints are in redistricting, whether they be constraints by the state constitution, state laws or constraints given by federal court rulings,” he said. “With that, we can formulate a way to evaluate the quality of the given redistricting plan and then we can try to optimize that result.”
While advancements in computer programming and supercomputing are helping researchers improve redistricting models, Kelly acknowledged that they can also be used for nefarious purposes.
“It’s becoming clear that it’s easier to draw unfair districts,” he said. “The conclusion would be that with the availability of so much digital data that allows you to predict the voting patterns of individual voters and allows you to manipulate these district boundaries, it is creating a situation where more and more states are creating district boundaries that favor the political party that happens to be in power in the given state.”
With so much controversy today surrounding redistricting, it is questionable whether the problems of partisan gerrymandering will ever go away. Despite considerable effort by researchers like Norpoth and Kelly, conflict over district boundaries may be a feature inherent to any system that requires those lines to be redrawn.
When asked whether the redistricting process could ever become fairer, Kelly said, “Yes, I believe it could be more fair. … But would I predict that would ever happen? I would not bet on it.”
Sophia Bica is Northport High School’s Female Athlete of the Year. Photo by Steven Zaitz
By Steven Zaitz
A cavalcade of stars – both athletic and academic – walked the blue and gold carpet of the Northport High School main auditorium on Friday night for the 2022 NESPY awards.
The best and brightest senior Tiger athletes were recognized for their accomplishments on and off the field during 2021-22 – and in a year of great success for the Northport Athletic Program as a whole, there were almost too many to count.
Sophia Bica and Dylan McNaughton were the biggest winners, each grabbing two individual awards and one team award, as well as Jason Ahlstrand, who won for best Male Athlete. Head baseball coach Sean Lynch and girls head soccer coach Aija Gipp presided over the ceremonies.
Bica, who will attend the Stevens Institute of Technology in the fall, won for Best Female Athlete as well as Best Record-Breaking career. She led the Lady Tigers Field Hockey team to a New York State Championship last November and a Long Island Title in 2020, a year that had no State play. Bica, a starter on the field hockey team since the eighth grade, holds the Northport High School record for assists in a career.
She was also a superstar point guard and four-year varsity player for Coach Castellano and his Lady Tigers basketball team. She led Northport to the Suffolk County AA Championships in three of those years and this past season, was the league’s Most Valuable Player. In addition to these individual awards, Bica’s Field Hockey squad won the 2022 NESPY statue for Best Female team. She will be playing both sports at Stevens.
“I will cherish this recognition and will always remember the great feeling I got every time I went out there with my team and had a big win,” said Bica, who glowed in a pink and gray flowery chiffon gown.
McNaughton, for as long as the people of Northport can remember, has never taken a day off. From the classroom to the gridiron over to the hardwood and the Lacrosse field, Big Dyl’s uniform was always dirty and there wasn’t a loose ball that he didn’t think was his.
In his senior year he was All-Suffolk at linebacker for the football team, played for the county championship in basketball and was one win away from winning a New York State Title in lacrosse. In the classroom, he had a 104.9 weighted grade point average which made him a National Football Foundation Scholar Athlete. McNaughton, who is headed for the University of Indiana, won NESPYs for Best Male Student Athlete and Male Tiger Icon Athlete. The Lacrosse team, for whom he scored 14 goals in 2022, was awarded Male Team of the Year for their State Title game appearance.
“Winning two NESPYs was a special way to end my Tiger career,” said McNaughton. “Ever since freshman year I wanted to win one and last night that dream came true, and it was awesome.”
Jason Ahlstrand of Tiger Football and Basketball is the 2021-22 NESPY Male Athlete of the Year. Photo by Steven Zaitz
Ahlstrand, whose dazzling smile and flamboyant style of play made him a Tiger fan favorite, won for Best Male Athlete.
From his crazy basketball dunks to his long touchdown catches, Ahlstrand was one of the most entertaining sports stars to grace Northport High School in recent years. He was also a deadly accurate field goal kicker and if he was defending you in basketball, you were in for a very long day. He was All-Suffolk County in football in 2021 and MVP of the team, recording seven touchdowns and 67 total points. He helped the Hoopin’ Tigers to a 50-6 record during his three-year career at guard and was a key member of the team that upset Brentwood for a Suffolk Title in 2020-21. He ended his career by taking home the NESPY for Best Male Athlete and will play football at SUNY Cortland in September.
“I’m just so happy to receive this award,” said Ahlstrand. I’m glad that I’ll always have these memories to look back on.”
Bica’s field hockey teammate and lacrosse star Angelina Longo was voted Iconic Female Athlete of the year. The future Arizona State Sun Devil and two-time all-New York State defender had 19 steals in the Field Hockey Championship game against Shenendehowa in the Lady Tigers breathtaking 1-0 victory at Centereach. She was also the all-state Sportsmanship Award recipient in 2022 and was the embodiment of #NotDoneYet nation during their undefeated 21-0 campaign.
Lisa Kovacs, one of the most well-rounded people ever to grace the hallways of N.H.S., was awarded the Best Female Student-Athlete. Kovacs led the girls soccer team to a 14-3 record and a number one seed in the Suffolk County AA playoff bracket this past autumn.This is a small blip on the radar screen of what Kovacs is all about. She qualified for National Honor Society and made the Honor Roll every quarter of her academic career, she’s been the Student Council Class President three years running, a volunteer Math Tutor, a Doctors of Tomorrow Program Award recipient, and she even works at the hotdog stand on Football Saturdays. Kovacs is as big a part of the fabric of the Northport High School student body as there is, and she’s also a tough-as-nails soccer player who battles deep in the dirt for every possession. She will be attending Northwestern University in Evanston, IL.
Nick Watts isn’t your average basketball big man. Although he is 6’7”, he doesn’t just lurk around the paint and post up his man for easy layups. He does everything well, he’s a fiery competitor and a great and unselfish teammate. Watts was awarded the NESPY for Best Breakthrough Athlete and Best Individual Performance. He earned the latter for his 12 three pointers and 42 points in the first half against Connetquot – one of the most memorable Tiger feats in 2021-22, in a year filled with them. Watts is also a great rebounder, passer, shot blocker and overall defender.He will attend the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown.
On a team of stars, future Duke Blue Devil Kaylie Mackiewicz snagged the Best Female Individual Performance NESPY for her unstoppable goal-scoring abilities in girls lacrosse. A five-year varsity starter, she scored the game-winning goal in double overtime to win the Long Island Championship just a few weeks ago.It’s only one of a dizzying checklist of achievements for the All-American who scored 138 goals over the past two years, has a weighted GPA of over 100, and is an Academic All American.
Other 2021-22 NESPY winners are Charlotte McGroarty for female Breakthrough Athlete of the Year. McGroarty was part of a State Championship field hockey team, a State finalist lacrosse team and Suffolk County finals-reaching basketball team. Chase Hendrickson, who ran track for the first time this year, qualified for States in the 400-meter sprint. He won the NESPY for male Breakthrough Athlete of the Year. Will Flynn was the winner of the Comeback Player of the Year NESPY, as he made it back on the football and lacrosse fields after suffering a torn labrum which required surgery and a grueling rehab. Aiden Stang won for Best Upset of the Year as he defeated the top ranked wrestler in his weight class in the League II tournament. Tom Izzo was awarded the NESPY for Courage as a member of the Tiger Unified basketball team, for whom he played all four years of his high school career.
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