Make New York Post a Preferred Source On Friday, Port Washington’s varsity football team won its first playoff game since Gerald Ford was president.
The Vikings (7-2) routed Plainview-Old Bethpage 40-0 in the opening round, snapping a postseason drought dating to 1976 and advancing to the Nassau County semifinals.
“We’re not satisfied just because we won a game,” senior right tackle Max Eynon, who protects his twin brother, QB Harry Eynon, told The Post. “There’s no surprise on this field, and with this team that we got here. This was the goal, and we’re still going.”
The fourth seed has its toughest task yet waiting Saturday at Hofstra University: the undefeated and top-seeded Massapequa Chiefs, who snapped Garden City’s nation-leading 68-game win streak on the same field in September.
“They’re a great team. … But it’s about us and what we do right here,” Harry Eynon added.
The Vikings aren’t looking back half a century to the days of disco, but instead to last year, when Port Wash fell to Syosset 49-48 on a failed two-point conversion in an opening-round, double-overtime crusher.
“I think as soon as that clock struck zero, we wanted to be right back here,” Harry said. “We were hungry for it.”
The buy-in came easily for a group head coach Kevin Cloghessy called a “player-led team.”
“A lot of times after practices, kids are speaking up and sending the message,” he said. “It really comes from them.”
The team is loose heading into the rematch against the Chiefs, who defeated the Vikings 42-12 in Week 1.
“We want to play our game, worrying about us, and everything else should take care of itself,” said Max Eynon, an Ohio State lacrosse commit.
They were jamming out to Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Free Bird” at practice and making lots of noise when Cloghessy attempted field goals at the end of that workout.
“We always say that we play our best when we’re loose,” senior linebacker James McCormack said.
Senior running back Joe Fox added that the team is bumping and thumping after big wins.
“A new tradition this year that we’ve had is, just after a win, we’ll go in the locker room, celebrate it together, and jump around to that song, ‘Jump Around,’” he said of the House of Pain hit played at University of Wisconsin football games.
This senior core didn’t have a contact youth program in town when they were younger and only put the pads on for the first time as seventh graders — but they still found their passion early.
“In sixth grade, we used to come here, and we would just play tackle with no pads on,” 12th-grade receiver Levi Felix said. “I feel like that’s how our love for the game started.”
They were also already being mentored by Cloghessy in their PE classes at that age.
“He would always tell us, y’all are going to be up there, you guys are going to do it, it’s going to be your grade,” Felix added. “He just had that in our minds.”
Harry Eynon remembers being a water boy for the varsity team in middle school, visualizing his day on the field.
“We would all be dreaming about this exact moment,” he said.
The tide has since turned as Port Youth Activities revived its youth tackle program a few years ago, which has fellow senior wideout Eddie Conlon hopeful for the next generation.
“Sometimes when we have a game, there’ll be a youth game wrapping up,” he said. “There’s a good amount of kids there playing, and it just gives us hope for the future.”
Cloghessy is eager for those baby Vikings to join the Valhalla varsity someday — but right now he’s cherishing every second he has with what has been an exceptional group — one that is deeply fond of their shared connection over the years.
“I love them, and I know they love me,” Conlon said of Cloghessy and the other coaches.
“To watch them grow up from the middle school to the high school, throughout football,” Cloghessy said, “It’s really special. I care a lot about these kids.”
