Mistakes plague Prep in EMass final loss

BROCKTON – The St. John’s Prep baseball team saw its dreams of playing for a state title come crashing down in a heap of errors on Tuesday at Campanelli Stadium.After winning the North title by playing four nearly flawless games, the Eagles were betrayed by their defense in the Division 1 Eastern Mass. final, committing three critical errors that put them in an 8-0 hole they could never recover from as Xaverian took a 12-7 win over its Catholic Conference rival.”We certainly didn’t play our usual solid game,” Prep coach Pat Yanchus said. “Xaverian made all the plays and we didn’t. That was the difference.”Xaverian (15-10) was one strike from being eliminated in round one of the South sectional before rallying to beat Braintree and then needed a pair of 13-inning wins to escape the South tourney. On Tuesday, the Hawks had their hitting shoes on against Nick Fabrizio.The Hawks scored in six of the first seven innings, led by Kevin Aufiero’s 4-for-5, three-RBI, four-runs-scored performance. Xaverian also only made one error behind Mike Galvin in the field.”We did a good job of not panicking when they made their little run at us,” Xaverian coach Gerry Lambert said. “We kept our composure.”Xaverian had to work out of a first-inning jam as St. John’s (16-9) leadoff batter Anthony Capuano walked and stole second. Galvin then got the next three batters in a row to end the threat.The Hawks then didn’t waste much time in getting started against Fabrizio. Chris Hoyt led off with a single and came around to score on Aufiero’s triple to center. Kyle MacDonald then reached on an error, scoring Aufiero for a 2-0 lead. He later scored when Gerard Florentino reached on another Prep error for a 3-0 lead after one.The Hawks kept on scoring in the second, taking advantage of another Prep mistake while pounding out four more hits off Fabrizio to extend the lead to 7-0.Derek Reddy and Hoyt led off with back-to-back singles before a perfectly executed double steal put them on second and third. An Aufiero single scored Reddy with Hoyt coming in on an errant pickoff attempt.MacDonald followed with a hit that plated Aufiero and Florentino’s sacrifice fly capped the four-run rally.Xaverian kept on coming in the third as Reddy’s two-out single scored Jon Kelley, who had walked and stolen second, for an 8-0 lead. The Eagles had what looked to be a big inning thwarted in the fourth as Justin Peluso picked up the Prep’s first hit and Kevin Barry followed with a walk before being called out on a controversial play at second on Pat Connaughton’s fielder’s choice.Kevin Davis grounded into another fielder’s choice to score Peluso before Galvin got Tyler Coppola on a popup to prevent further damage.Xaverian got the run right back in the bottom of the inning as Aufiero picked up his third hit of the night and scored on Florentino’s sac fly to center.”I don’t know what it was, but Nick hasn’t been hit like that all season,” Yanchus said.The Eagles responded by turning the blowout into a contest?despite a horrible baserunning faux pas in the fifth.Dillon Gonzalez’s drag bunt single was the catalyst the Prep needed. Cam Davey followed with a triple to the deepest part of Campanelli to cut the gap to 9-2. Alex Markakis’ groundout brought in another run.Capuano and Peluso followed with walks before Barry sliced a single to right. Inexplicably, both runners stopped at second and third, resulting in Barry being tagged out.Connaughton delivered a 2-run single up the middle to make it 9-5 and Davis followed with a triple to right-center to cut the lead to three.”We knew they would make a run ? it’s like basketball, you can’t go a full 48 minutes, or nine innings, in this case, without a team like that doing that,” Lambert said.The Eagles threatened again in the sixth but Galvin got out of a two-men-on jam before his mates padded the lead in the bottom of the inning.Hoyt walked with one out and Aufiero picked up his fourth hit and second triple to make it 10-6. MacDonald f