Prep Talk

Licata's new number: 492

Joe Licata is still the Western New York record holder for most passing yards in a single game, but Billies officials reported Friday night after further review they need to set the record straight.

Instead of 522 yards, the Williamsville South junior quarterback threw for an official 492. The 30-yard difference involved two plays that were discovered after a careful review of the film.

The first play was a 15-yard penalty that was added onto the end of a 20-yard catch. Licata was originally credited with a 35-yard completion. The second play was a 15-yard penalty that was erroneously recorded as a 15-yard catch.

Licata's record effort came in a 62-32 nonleague win over Williamsville North.

"We got a hold of the game film this morning and saw that those yards were misrepresentated," said South assistant coach Kevin Lester Jr. "We're not playing any games, we're just doing our best to get it right."

The previous record for most yards passing in a game, 455, had been held since 1980 by Jerry Hickson of Cheektowaga.

---Mary Jo Monnin

Will North field hockey on a roll

Check out the High School Extra for a busy Wednesday of fall sports. Here are some extra notes from around the fields:

* * *

Williamsville North field hockey coach Kris LaPaglia has the Spartans firing on all cylinders early this season. The latest example: an 8-0 domination of Holland.

"We're working well as a team right now and we have a lot of kids who can be offensive threats," LaPaglia said.

Playing that role Wednesday was junior Alley Ahern, who had four goals.

 "This is a big year for her," LaPaglia said. "She's been with me for a couple of years now and her game has really improved. Her skill level is very high."

Nikki Atkins added a hat trick and backup sophomore goalie Alayna Wageman got the shutout. The Spartans are now 4-0 on the season.

* * *

 In girls soccer action, Jackie April had the game-winning goal midway through the second second half as Orchard Park stayed unbeaten at 3-0 in ECIC I with a 2-1 win over Frontier.

Nichols senior Bri Smith had all five goals in her team's 5-0 shutout of Sacred Heart in Monsignor Martin action. Smith now has 19 goals in seven games after scoring 59 a season ago. Bethany Novak and Meaghan Heldwein split the shutout in goal for the Vikings (6-1).

---Jay Skurski

Commenting available on stories

If you haven't seen it already, check out the commenting that is available on all stories on buffalonews.com.

A quick log-on process gets you started. It should be interesting, especially once high school season rolls around again (right around the corner!). Of course, we'll continue to encourage feedback and interactivity through the comments here on the Prep Talk blog.

---Keith McShea

Summer hoops -- and the Tom Borrelli Memorial Award PreTournament Raffle

I am selling raffle tickets for The Tom Borrelli Memorial Award and Scholarship Fund -- it's a pretournament raffle with lots of super cool prizes.

Check 'em out:

* Six box-seat tickets to a Sabres game courtesy of Try-It Distributing;
* Six box-seat tickets to a Bandits game courtesy of Try-It Distributing;
* Jim Kelly autographed football;
* Ken Whisenhunt autographed Arizona Cardinals cap;
* Larry Fitzgerald autographed Sports Illustrated cover;
* Masters golf tournament assortment (hat, flag, hat clip);
* $50 gift certificate to Tempo Restaurant.

Tickets are $5 each, a great value for some great prizes and a great fund-raiser.

I'll be checking out some summer league hoops Thursday evening at Sweet Home, so if anyone is headed down there they can catch me there after 6:15 p.m. I'm hoping to make the July 16 session at St. Joe's as well. Some good teams are lined up -- in addition to the Panthers and Marauders, Niagara Falls, Canisius, Grover Cleveland and Williamsville South are part of the sessions.

If anyone has any other good ideas for some summer high school hot spots -- in any sport -- where I can sell some tickets, please let me know via e-mail (kmcshea@buffnews.com).

If you'd like to purchase some tickets, also just email me and I'll set some aside -- I'll send you an address where you can send a check.

There are a limited amount of tickets so let me know as soon as possible.

Any help is much appreciated.

The raffle drawing is Sunday, July 19, which is the day before the Tom Borrelli Golf Tournament.

---Keith McShea

What I did this summer, part II

During the summer one of the hats I wear is that of an auto racing reporter. I'll be blogging live during today's Camping World Grand Prix at the Glen over at the Sports, Ink. blog.

---Keith McShea

Maple Grove among NYSSWA's All-Sport champions

The New York State Sportswriters Association has come up with a great idea -- and some Section VI schools like Maple Grove are getting some all-around recognition because of it.

The NYSSWA today announced its inaugural All-Sport Championships, which measure New York State Public High School Athletic Association schools (that means no Catholic schools) by their across-the-board performances in state championships in all sports (boys and girls).

Maple Grove, which won the state football championship this year and advanced to the final four in boys basketball, shared the top spot in Class D with South Kortright. 

The only other two Section VI schools to make it into the top five were both in Class B: second-place East Aurora was just .33 behind Bronxville (37 points); Fredonia was fourth with 22 points.

Check out the NYSSWA's All-Sport Championships page, where it crowns Burnt Hills (which Sweet Home beat in the Class A football championship game) as its overall winner for amassing the most points. East Aurora's total was the fourth-highest overall.

There are breakdowns by boys and girls. For the boys, Orchard Park tied for first in Class AA, East Aurora was first and Southwestern tied for third in Class B and Maple Grove was first in Class D.

On the girls side, Class B East Aurora was second and Fredonia was fifth. Salamanca was fourth in Class C and Sherman was fifth in Class D.
 
---Keith McShea

Class A baseball: Grand Island 10, Albion 3

Grand Island won its first Section VI Class A baseball championship in nearly 30 years by pounding out 12 hits and scoring runs in every inning except the first in a 10-3 victory over Albion on Thursday night at Coca-Cola Field.

Grand Island’s last sectional championship was 1980 and this was the school’s first appearance in the title game since 1985.

---Rodney McKissic

Class AA baseball: Clarence 5, Frontier 0

Frontier outscored Clarence, 29-3, in the two meetings for Thursday's Section VI Class AA baseball championship, but sophomore Zach Lauricella pitched a complete-game shutout to give Clarence the title for the second time in three seasons.

---Rodney McKissic

Live chat June 2

Tonight's live chat will be something of a Western New York High School SportsCenter.

As soon as I finish writing my story about the Section VI girls lacrosse championship tripleheader, I'll be online where the discussion will have plenty of fields to play on: in addition to those girls lacrosse finals, there are semifinals in boys lacrosse, quarterfinals in softball and the first game of the Georgetown Cup in baseball.

We should get started around 10:30 p.m. (because my story for Wednesday's paper has to be finished by then).

There should also be some baseball talk as the finals have been set - check out the link at the right for posts where you can make your picks and discuss the finals. There is also a place for softball and lacrosse comments as well.

If you won't be online for the chat, feel free to ask some questions you'd like to see addressed in the comments section.

Same policy for afterwards -- got a comment on what was discussed? Just add it below.

---Keith McShea

Cornell Cup League I final: Hutch-Tech 11, McKinley 1

While Lafayette and daVinci had a pitcher's duel, Hutch-Tech's bats detonated for 11 runs in a 11-1 victory over McKinley for the League I Cornell Cup championship.

Tech scored four runs in the first and never looked back and pitcher Mike Koenig struck out seven while the one run McKinley scored was unearned on when Chris Hanaka scored on a hit and an error.

---Rodney McKissic