The scream was heard from the huddle above the din of the crowd.
It was unmistakable to the Roslyn volleyball team who was shouting, even as the crowd screamed and the Lawrence High School players and fans whooped and hollered for the first time in an hour.
After dominating the first two sets of the Division II boys volleyball county title game at Wantagh High School on Nov. 12, Roslyn had just watched two championship points slip away, and Lawrence grabbed a 28-26 squeaker to stay alive.
Panic could’ve set in. Memories of just four days earlier could’ve come flooding back when, in the semis, Roslyn blew a two-set lead against Elmont before rallying in five.
But none of that happened. Instead, Tomer Gilady yelled one word.
“Relax! Relax!”
That’s what captains do in tense situations; they lead. And the Bulldogs listened.
Reverting back to their form from the first two sets, Roslyn dominated the fourth set, 25-14, and won its first county title since 2021 with a 25-15, 25-14, 26-28, 25-14 win.
The triumph vaulted Roslyn (19-3) into the Long Island Championship game against Eastport-South Manor on Nov.15 at East Meadow H.S.
In that match, Roslyn had the unusual situation of being at a decided size disadvantage, as nearly every Sharks starter was 6-foot or taller.
Eastport-South Manor, which came in undefeated and had only lost one set all year, won the first game 25-18, as the Bulldogs’ passing and communication weren’t sharp.
In set two, Roslyn scrapped their way back from an early deficit, cutting the score to 13-12, but ESM settled the match and grabbed a 25-17 win.
The third set was more of the same, as the taller, harder-hitting Sharks grabbed an early lead and ran away with the match, winning 25-9.
“Our gameplan was to limit No. 7 (Ayden DesLauriers) in the front row, but he was even more of a factor in the back row,” Roslyn head coach Mark Steinmuller said. “We hung with them for a while, but they found things that had worked and we weren’t able to stop them.”
Still, for Roslyn, the high of winning the county title wasn’t going to fade anytime soon.
“We never lost confidence and we knew since the start of the year that we could do this, and needed to do this,” said senior Zach Kuppersmith, the lone 12th-grade starter. “I was a JV kid my freshman year and saw what that (2021 team) did, so to be able to repeat it is just incredible.”
Roslyn rolled over Lawrence thanks to a team effort, but two players stood out especially. Sophomore Joseph Kim got into an unreal zone in the second set, winning six consecutive points on his own, and finished with 15 kills and two blocks.
“I don’t even remember how that happened, it was surreal, just surreal,” Kim said. “I was just so locked in and everything was coming to me.”
Junior Benji Rubin also excelled, as the 6-foot-5 tower of arms and legs had seven kills and five blocks.
“I call him ‘Playoff Benji’ because he’s stepped up so much for us,” said Roslyn coach Mark Steinmuller, in his second season as varsity coach. “We knew we were taller than them and had the height advantage, and he and Zack stepped up so great tonight.”
Kuppersmith, who recovered from sending a kill on match point about 10 feet long after hitting the ball “harder than I’ve ever hit a ball in my life,” finished with four aces, nine kills and three blocks, while Gilady had eight kills and six blocks.
The Bulldogs and Golden Tornadoes met once earlier in the season, with Roslyn winning in five games, but this one was much more one-sided.
“We were more prepared, and felt like we had good matchups across the board that could contain them,” Steinmuller said. “That one rally in the second set, when we had four or five blocks in a row, that gave us energy and catapulted us forward.”
“This is the one we wanted; winning LIC would be ice cream on top of the cake,” Kuppersmith said. “To be able to get past everything and win this with my brothers, it just feels amazing.”
Despite the loss in the LIC, the future certainly looks bright for Roslyn. Kuppersmith is the only player graduating from the starting lineup, so Steinmuller expects big things from the 2025 squad.
“This was a great year, we’d never won this many games before (19), and today is sad but this a celebration of our season,” Steinmuller said after the LIC defeat. “We didn’t like the taste of defeat, and I think our younger guys will use that as motivation going forward.”
