English baseball rolls to shutout win over Classical

LYNN – With a wind gusting to over 35 mph blowing directly into Fraser Field on Thursday, it was most definitely a pitcher’s day as Lynn Classical and Lynn English met for the first time this season.With the gusts playing havoc on any ball hit in the air, ground balls were at a premium and English starter Sam Hill took full advantage. Hill held Classical to four hits while the Bulldog offense saw seven different players get hits en route to a 12-0 win.Click here for a photo gallery.”Sam did an outstanding job,” English coach Joe Caponigro said. “We had him at only 99 pitches. He threw very well and definitely was the story.”Across the diamond, it was a different story for the Rams as the middle innings proved to be their undoing on Thursday. It was in those three innings where the Bulldogs scored nine times to break the game open.”Joe does such a great job over there with those guys,” Classical coach Mike Zukowski said. “But you can’t win when you don’t hit and we only got four hits.”Neither team could score in the opening two innings before the Bulldogs (5-1) got the bats going in the third with a one-out double from Ben Bowden.A fielder’s choice erased Bowden at third before Junior Santos reached on an infield single that scored Gabe Smith for a 1-0 lead. Classical starter Greg Rybak then got Dani Vincente to ground to second but the ball was booted to extend the inning.The error proved costly as Roberto Reyes followed with a walk that preceded a 2-run single from Brian Maynard that upped the gap to 3-0.”Hitting is kind of contagious and we started to hit the ball (against Revere),” Caponigro said. “It was good to see that continue in this game.”Hill had to work around a nervous moment in the Classical half of the third when the wind played havoc with Eddie Terrero’s fly to center, resulting in an error and a runner on second. That threat died, though, when Ellido Reyes popped back to the mound.English added to its lead in the fourth when Brendan Carritte led off with a triple and scored when Pat Cullen reached on an error. Hill also had settled down nicely, allowing two hits over the first four innings.The Bulldogs put any doubts about the outcome away in the fifth by sending 11 batters to the plate, knocking Rybak from the game and scoring five times.Santos walked to lead off and went to third on Vincente’s double. Reyes then doubled to left, scoring both runners to make it 6-0.After a strikeout, Eric Bransfield walked and Carritte singled home pinch runner Matt Merritt for a 7-0 lead that knocked Rybak out in favor of Tyler Gauthier. Pat Cullen drew a walk and Bowden drilled a 2-run single to center for a commanding 9-0 lead.”They hit the ball hard and put it in play,” Zukowski said.Tensions momentarily increased in the sixth when Terrero was hit by a pitch and took a long glance out to the mound while heading down to first base. Gauthier followed with a base hit before Hill struck out the next three batters to end that threat.English added three runs in the seventh on a Reyes sac fly and a 2-run triple from Maynard that closed the scoring.