Powicki pitches Wyoma past Lynnfield

LYNN – Thrust into the pressure cooker that was Thursday’s winner’s bracket semifinal against defending District 16 champion Lynnfield, Wyoma’s Brendan Powicki stepped up in a huge way.Forced to take the mound in the second inning because of an arm injury to starter Brendan O’Neil, the 11-year-old excelled, holding Lynnfield to one hit in the final five innings and also added a 2-run double in a third-inning rally to push his team into Saturday’s winner’s bracket final versus Swampscott (at Revere, 5) via a 3-1 win at Volunteer Field.”Powicki came in and just took control for us,” Wyoma manager Paul Holey said. “Losing Brendan like we did to the injury was tough but (Powicki) threw strikes all game.”Lynnfield starter Pat Davis was equal to the challenge most of the way on Thursday, save for a stretch at the start of the third that saw Wyoma strike for its three runs.”It really was a well played game by both teams,” Lynnfield manager Kevin Canty said. “They just had that one big inning where they were able to string together a few hits against Pat.”It’s hard to point to the first inning as a momentum changer, but in this game it certainly proved to be one.Davis got Wyoma out relatively easily in the top of the first before his teammates threatened in a major way in the bottom half of the inning.Brendan Sullivan led off with a single and was sacrificed to second by Nick Eliopoulos. O’Neil then hit Adam Buchanan before striking out Jake McQue.Davis kept the inning going when he reached on an error at third to load the bases. O’Neil then grazed the jersey of Spencer Balian, forcing Sullivan home for a 1-0 lead. That was all Lynnfield would get, though, as Matt Gallo went down swinging to stop the threat in its tracks.Canty knew immediately that only getting one run in that scenario could be costly.”We really did need to get more than one there with the bases loaded,” Canty said.” We could have put them on their heels a bit and we weren’t able to do it.”Wyoma put the leadoff batter on in the second but Davis struck out Matt Cunha and then got Herbie Newton to ground into a 5-4-3 double play to end the inning.O’Neil came out to start the bottom of the second but departed after going to a 3-1 count on Dan O’Leary. Powicki came in from shortstop and issued the walk before striking out two of the next three batters to end the inning.Neither team could score in the third before Wyoma’s bats finally showed some life in the top of the fourth.Brett Holey reached on an infield single to start the rally. Brett Molea followed with a single and Holey went to third moments later on a pickoff attempt. After Molea swiped second, Powicki missed a home run by inches, ripping a double off the top of the centerfield fence to give his team a 2-1 lead.Davis struck out the next batter before Ryan Borders hit a sacrifice fly to center, scoring Powicki to give Wyoma a 3-1 lead.”That third was a big inning for us,” Holey said. “We were down early but I was happy with how the team hung in and kept plugging away.”Now taking the bump with the lead, Powicki got downright stingy. Over the final three innings, he allowed only two runners to reach and held Lynnfield hitless through that stretch.”Powicki came in and did a really great job for them,” Canty said. “We just couldn’t get a couple of hits when we needed them.”