PITTSFIELD, Mass. – Jake Duquette scored on a wild pitch in the bottom of the eighth Tuesday to give the Pittsfield baseball team a 5-4 win over Agawam on Pellerin Field.
The Generals survived on a day when their bats fell largely silent thanks to 7-? innings of sterling work on the hill from Connor Lavinio.
Lavinio was pressed into service in the top of the first when starter Ben Cornish felt a tweak in his shoulder.
Lavinio went on to allow just two earned runs in a little more than a complete game on the hill, striking out seven.
He got stronger as the game went along, holding the visitors scoreless over the final four innings and pitching out of jams in the sixth and the eighth.
“My curve ball came alive in the later innings,” Lavinio said. “I can’t keep throwing them fastballs because, a couple of times through the order, they’re going to start picking up on it. My curve ball started to get better as the game went along.
Pittsfield coach Drew Pearce was quick to lift Cornish at the first sign of any physical difficulty and confident to turn to Lavinio, who earned his first win of the season.
“He was awesome,” Pearce said. “Pitching ahead all day. And when he got behind, he got right back in the counts.
“I tell you what, he wouldn’t have thrown as many pitches if we had played some defense behind him early. He would have cruised through this thing. We stumbled a little defensively. But that’s the way it is when it’s a wet day. You’ve gotta take advantage of what they give you, and we can’t give away too much, either.”
Agawam struck the first blow in the top of the first, getting three hits and a run off Cornish before Lavinio came on with the bases loaded and got a groundout to shortstop Nick Brindle to end the inning.
Pittsfield answered right back in the bottom of the first.
Ben Jacob led off with a single up the middle, stole second, moved up on a fly ball and scored on Brindle’s single to make it 1-1. Brindle then stole second, moved up on a groundout and scored on a passed ball to make it 2-1.
Agawam tied it with an unearned run in the top of the second, taking advantage of a pair of Pittsfield errors.
But the Generals got that run back in the bottom of the second when Walker Abdallah walked, stole second and scored on Morrie Fried’s RBI single.
In the bottom of the third, Pittsfield went ahead, 4-2. This time, Duquette walked, stole second and came home on an error in the outfield.
Agawam tied the game in the top of the fourth, getting one run on a sac fly and another on a balk with a man at third to make it 4-4.
Pittsfield’s offense, which had three hits and three runs in the first two innings, dried up starting with the fourth as the Generals were held hitless and could not get a runner past second base in the third through seventh innings.
Meanwhile, Agawam loaded the bases with two out in the sixth before Lavinio again got a groundball out from Brindle at short.
In the top of the eighth, Lavinio hit two batters to put the potential go-ahead run in scoring position with one out. But a fly ball to right fielder Duquette and Lavinio’s seventh strikeout of the game ended the threat.
Duquette then led off the bottom of the eighth by crushing a double to left-center for Pittsfield’s only extra-base hit of the afternoon.
“He’s been big for us all season long,” Pearce said. “He had a little bit of a back issue. We had to DH him for a little bit. And he’s feeling healthy again, and you could see it right there.
“That’s all we needed, for him to catch a barrel right there and get on second base for us.”
Jackson Almeida followed with an infield single to put runners at the corners, and Agawam opted to intentionally walk Lavinio to load the bases with nobody out.
That risky move never factored into the game, though, as the fifth pitch to Abdallah got away from Agawam’s catcher, allowing Duquette to race home with the winning run.
Pittsfield (7-3) hosts West Springfield on Friday.
