Drury Advances to State Final Four
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. – Carson Rylander was dominant Sunday as the Drury baseball team beat Mount Everett, 4-0, in the quarter-finals of the Division 5 State Tournament.
Rylander allowed one hit and struck out nine in a complete game effort as the third-seeded Blue Devils advanced to the state semi-finals to face No. 2 English High of Boston, a 9-3 winner over Charlestown on Sunday.
“We haven’t been here in like 30 years, so it feels pretty good,” Rylander said. “I just joined the team a couple of years ago. Love these guys.
“We’re a family. We come out here every day, doing the same work – practice by practice, game by game. Coming out here, same approach, working hard and grinding.”
On Sunday, Rylander allowed just three baserunners and retired the first 10 batters he faced.
“He was on,” Mount Everett coach Dan Lanoue said. "We saw him earlier in the season, where, you know, maybe he was a little bit rusty from the winter.
“But he was on today. Once we got on, we tried to bunt, try to steal, tried to do something, but the defense was too strong.”
The Eagles’ Matt Lowe was equally effective through the first couple of innings.
In the third, Drury broke through by applying some pressure on the base paths.
Noah Arnold recorded the first hit of the game with a one-out single to left field. He then stole second with two out. An errant throw allowed Arnold to get up and come all the way around to score on the play, giving the Blue Devils a 1-0 lead.
Lowe then gave up a walk but got out of the inning with a ground ball to second baseman Johnny Ireland, and the Eagles starter threw a 1-2-3 fourth to keep it a one-run game.
In the fifth, Drury finally got its bats going.
Jake McAllister got things started by drawing a leadoff walk. After a fielder’s choice put Brayden Canales at first, Arnold moved him into scoring position with his second hit of the day.
Rylander, Connor Hinkell and JJ Prenguber followed with RBI singles to give their team a 4-0 lead going to the sixth inning.
Drury coach Robert Jutras said that getting the first run of the game helped spark the Blue Devils’ offense.
“It kind of checked a box,” He said. “You want to strike first. You don’t care how it’s going to happen. We knew it was going to be a knockdown, drag out type of thing. The guys knew getting to one was going to be important. And then getting to two was going to be important and getting to three was going to be important.
“The urgency was there to get that first one on the board.”
After falling behind by four, Mount Everett got a lift with its first hit of the game, a leadoff single from Ireland, the hero of its Sweet 16 win on Thursday. But two ground balls and a popup kept the Eagles from mounting a rally.
Rylander then worked a 1-2-3 seventh, getting his ninth strikeout for the game’s final out.
The Eagles, who lost by one run in the Round of 16 a year ago, got one step further this spring.
“Last year when we lost at Douglas, I said we had a young team and I was looking forward to this year,” Lanoue said. “They met our expectations. Obviously, we wanted to go farther. But my younger guys who are on the bench can learn from the older guys.
“Sean [Warren], Matt [Lowe] and Jacob [Kreis] have been playing baseball for their whole life – a lot of summer baseball. And it showed this season.”