ITEM PHOTO: KATIE MORRISON
St. Mary’s pitcher Louis Vidal throws a pitch during a game against St. John’s Prep at Fraser Field on Tuesday.
By STEVE KRAUSE
LYNN — Ask St. John’s Prep coach Dan Letarte why he schedules a Division 3 team like St. Mary’s, and you’ll get a straight answer.
“Because of what you saw out there tonight,” said Letarte, after his No. 3-in-the-state Eagles had to sweat out a 5-3 win over the Spartans at Fraser Field Tuesday night.
“This is how St. Mary’s plays,” said Letarte, whose team appears well-positioned for a Super 8 run when the tournament pairings are announced this weekend. “They’re a state champion. They know how to win. This is why we schedule them.”
The Prep (14-5) had to get a two-out, two-strike, two-run triple from Frank DiOrio in the top of the seventh inning to escape with the win. And that only happened because St. Mary’s committed the game’s only error on Jacob Yish’s grounder to short a moment earlier.
“We had our chances,” said St. Mary’s coach Derek Dana, whose Spartans grabbed a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the first inning. “It didn’t go our way tonight, but if we’d executed some plays earlier in the game, they might not have climbed back into it.”
The seventh opened with Kordell Henriquez, the Spartans’ third pitcher of the night, getting the first two outs easily. Both Henriquez, and Tommy Cash before him, had stymied the Eagles from the third inning on. St. John’s only got four hits.
However, Michael Yarin worked a walk, and then Yish hit one right to shortstop. Antonio Felix’s throw was a little low to first, and when first baseman Tyler Donovan tried to dig it out, it rolled out of his glove. Yarin, running on the pitch, ended up on third.
Henriquez looked as if he’d be out of the jam, though, getting ahead of DiOrio, 0-2. However, DiOrio, batting from the right side for the first time all evening, fouled off three straight pitches before lacing a line drive into a very wide gap between left and center that scored both runners easily.
“That was a big hit by Frank,” said Letarte. “He’s a switch-hitter, and he hadn’t gotten anything from the left side.
“We needed that hit too,” he said. “We had to score in that inning. You don’t want to let them go into the home half of the last inning tied.”
Zach Begin, making his first start for St. John’s, ran into immediate trouble in the first inning, walking Donnie Weisse and then throwing a wild pitch behind Felix, allowing him to take second. Felix followed with a base hit scoring Weisse, and St. Mary’s had a 1-0 lead.
Nick Peveri singled to right, with Felix stopping at third. The Spartans then pulled off a double steal that resulted in Felix scoring the second Spartan run. Matt Costanza’s single to left scored Peveri.
After breezing through the first inning, St. Mary’s pitcher Louis Vidal ran into some serious trouble in the second. The Eagles scored twice on only one hit, thanks to four walks, including one to Jack Arend with the bases loaded.
Vidal was gone by the third after giving up a walk and a single, but Cash came on to put out the fire. St. John’s finally pulled even in the fourth. Mike Bournival led off with a double to left that came a few feet short of being a home run. A wild pitch got him to third, and Arend’s grounder to second scored him.
Neither team threatened after that until the top of the seventh. St. John’s got excellent relief pitching from Colin Nye after taking over for Begin. Nye lasted until the bottom of the seventh, when he gave way to Casey Bussone after walking leadoff hitter Henriquez. The Spartans put two runners on in the seventh, but Felix bounced one right to second baseman Jacob Spada, who was playing inches away from the bag, and he turned an easy double play to end the game.
This was an exclusion game for the Spartans, meaning it does not count toward their record for MIAA tournament seeding purposes. St. Mary’s is 13-7 overall, but 13-5 for seeding purposes. Both games in this weekend’s Clancy Tournament count toward postseason seeding.
