Connecticut Tops Pittsfield in 13-Year-Old Babe Ruth Regional
WESTFIELD, Mass. – A frustrating day ended in a frustrating manner for the Pittsfield Babe Ruth 13-year-old All-Stars on Friday: with the bases loaded and nobody out in the top of the seventh.
Pittsfield failed to convert on that opportunity or several others as Connecticut State Champion Bethel earned a 7-1 win in the opening game of the New England Babe Ruth Regional at Bullens Field.
The designated visitors faced a tall order going to the seventh down by six runs, but they got a lift when pinch-hitter Alex Woo started the inning with a single up the middle.
Jake Knauth and Mateo Herrera (3-for-4 with a double) followed with singles to load the bases. But Bethel reliever Alex Martin got a strikeout, a fly ball to short left and a groundout to the right side to end the threat.
The three seventh-inning hits gave Pittsfield an 8-4 advantage in hits and upped its number of runners left in scoring position to six.
“It’s tough when you outhit a team, eight to four,” Pittsfield coach Francis McKeon said. “You should win nine times out of 10. And unfortunately, today was that day that we just didn’t win the game.”
Bethel struck first in the bottom of the first, taking a 1-0 lead without a base hit.
Riley Rozan drew a leadoff walk, stole second, moved up on a sacrifice bunt and scored on a pitch that got to the backstop.
Pittsfield answered right away in the top of the second, Edaniel Hebert (2-for-3) hit a one-out single, and Oliver Brown bunted his way aboard before back-to-back walks by Andrew Scalise and James Vegas tied the game.
Bethel continued to score without a base hit in the second, using a couple of walks, an error and a sacrifice fly to retake the lead, 2-1.
But the game turned one inning later, when the first five Connecticut batters reached base and scored to make it 7-1 after three.
A Pittsfield error helped fuel the rally, which ended the day for starting pitcher Knauth and brought Scalise to the mound.
Scalise allowed just one unearned run in three innings of work before Herrera pitched a scoreless sixth.
“The same thing that happened in the state tournament against Westfield,” McKeon said. “That third inning, we just make mistakes and we can’t come back from it. That’s a 2-1 ballgame if we get rid of that third inning. But, unfortunately, in baseball you can’t get rid of innings.”
Pittsfield, which carries the Western Mass banner into the regional thanks to Westfield’s automatic bid as the tournament host, plays Eastern Mass champion Braintree on Saturday morning in the second of three pool play games.
“We’ve just got to come with a different attitude, a different energy,” McKeon said. “We’ve been telling these guys for three weeks: Their energy matters. And right now, it’s low, especially when we got down, 7-1.
“We’ve just got to get it going. We’ve got to want to be here. We’ve got to want to win.”
