English baseball falls to Lincoln-Sudbury

SUDBURY – There’s no secret to why the Lincoln-Sudbury baseball team is a perennial power every spring.It’s because the Warriors tattoo the baseball.And they hit the daylights out of it even when they’ve put themselves into a tremendous hole ? which is what they did Monday at Feeley Park. Lincoln-Sudbury spotted Lynn English a 5-0 lead and then charged back with 16 unanswered runs to win going away, 16-5, in a Division 1 North quarterfinal game.The Bulldogs end their season with a 16-6 record while the Warriors move on, and will play Lawrence Thursday (7) at LeLacheur Park in Lowell.English jumped ahead, 5-0, after two innings and the Warriors looked a bit disjointed in the process. In the first, Dani Vicente stroked a mammoth two-run homer that came after Junior Santos was hit by a pitch.The Bulldogs put two runners on base after that, via walks, before Randale Lora was called out on strikes to end the inning.English got three more in the second on a rally that began with two outs. Gabe Smith was hit by a pitch, Santos walked, and Vicente singled to drive home a run. After Roberto Reyes walked to reload the bases, Brian Maynard boomed a double to left. However, Reyes was tagged out trying to go to third from first base to end the inning.Getting out of that jam without any further damage seemed to inspire the Warriors. They scored four runs off lefty Ben Bowden in the bottom of the second, on two hits and two errors (the Bulldogs made seven during the game). It could have been worse, too, but Vicente made a nifty play at short on Carl Anderson’s hot grounder, tagging second himself and throwing to first to complete the double play.The Warriors threatened again in the third, but Bowden got out of a one-out, bases-loaded jam by inducing Adam Ravanelle to pop to short and Jack Harris to fly to center.”But,” said English coach Joe Caponigro, “his arm was getting a little tender at that point, so we had to put in (Pat Cullen).”And Cullen had no luck at all.”I think,” Caponigro said, “they hit two balls hard off him (in the fourth inning), and they were both home runs. Other than that, they hit little clinkers and bleeders that found holes or landed between fielders.”True enough. But Lincoln-Sudbury still put up seven runs in that fourth inning, sending 10 batters to the plate. Two walks sandwiched around a single loaded the bases for Anderson, who’d just missed hitting one out in the first. He didn’t miss this time, getting all of it and sending it over the right-field fence for a grand slam. A walk and a single later, Ravanelle hit a rope to center that looked, at first, as if Maynard might have a play. But it carried ? all the way over the fence for a three-run homer.”They hit the heck out of the ball,” Caponigro said. “They don’t strike out often. They put it in play. And we had trouble whenever they put the ball in play. What’d we make, seven errors?”At 11-5, the game was pretty much over. Four different L-S pitchers held English in check the rest of the way. And while Matt Burnham of English pitched well in relief of Cullen, he didn’t have much to show for it. English continued to have difficulties on defense and the Warriors kept piling up the runs.”We have 10 seniors, and it’ll be hard saying goodbye to them,” Caponigro said. “That’s one of the two things I find hard about coaching ? cutting kids and saying good bye to them when it’s over.”