{"id":129505,"date":"2025-10-22T16:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T20:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/riverheadnewsreview.timesreview.com\/?p=129505"},"modified":"2025-10-22T12:32:18","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T16:32:18","slug":"riverhead-field-hockey-barely-misses-playoffs-in-coachs-final-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/riverheadnewsreview.timesreview.com\/2025\/10\/129505\/riverhead-field-hockey-barely-misses-playoffs-in-coachs-final-season\/","title":{"rendered":"Riverhead field hockey barely misses playoffs in coach’s final season"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Before the Riverhead field hockey season started, head coach Cheryl Walsh-Edwards<\/a> felt that if they won the games they should and won some they shouldn’t, a playoff berth was within reach. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The team has steadily improved since 2022<\/a> \u2014 a season in which the Blue Waves mustered only two wins. The three seniors on the team today were freshmen in 2022, just trying to find a way to rebuild a program that had suffered mightily following austerity that saw all sports cut for a year. Kyleigh Lennon, Abigail Maaiki and Emma Kennedy took their lumps and bruises that year but it was the first true step in the rebuild.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2023, the team improved its win total to three and last year they finished the season 5-8-1. If Copiague had shown up on time Tuesday afternoon for the final game of the season at Pulaski Street Sports Complex, Riverhead would have had a chance to finish their season 7-7 on Senior Day, but instead the matchup ended in a tie because the game was called due to darkness. It left their final record at 6-7-1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m super upset that this is how our senior game went,\u201d Walsh-Edwards said. \u201cThese three girls deserved more than a half of a game in their last game of their careers. They worked so hard for the program. I couldn\u2019t have asked for more out of them during their time playing here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though playoffs weren\u2019t really in the equation on the final day of the season, with Riverhead positioned 12th in the standings<\/a> coming into the day, it could have been a proper farewell to the three. But had a few games over the course of the season gone a little differently, playoffs would absolutely be in the picture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe game that still bothers me to this day is the loss against Huntington,\u201d Walsh-Edwards said. \u201cWe had so many chances to win that game.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n