Swampscott, Peabody win Gallant openers

SALEM – Pitching ruled the night as the 27th annual Ray Gallant Memorial Baseball Tournament kicked off at Forest River Park on Thursday as both Peabody and Swampscott rode dominant mound efforts to victories on opening night.In the opener on Thursday, Swampscott’s Craig Murphy, Adrian Espinal and Ryan January teamed to throw a sterling one-hitter en route to a 4-0 win over host Salem. The nightcap saw Peabody’s Bobby Sullivan hold Beverly to two hits and one run while striking out eight over six innings as his team pulled away to a 5-1 win.Swampscott got all the runs it proved to need in the opener in the bottom of the first against Salem.Leo Wile and Donnie Weisse led off with singles before Salem’s Mike Mitchell, who threw well in his own right Thursday, got Ryan January to hit into a double play that scored Wile for a 1-0 lead.Murphy helped his cause by reaching second on a single and an outfield error before crossing on Matt Hubauer’s double to make it 2-0.Matt O’Connell got what proved to be the lone hit for Salem leading off the second before Murphy put away the next three hitters in order. Swampscott added another run in the bottom of the second as Ben Rossman led off with a single. Louis Oliveri and Wile added one-out hits before January walked with two outs to force home Rossman for a 3-0 lead.Murphy departed in the fourth in favor of Espinal, who faced the only serious Salem threat of the game. Mitchell reached on a leadoff error before being erased on a fielder’s choice. Connor Jennings walked before O’Connell grounded into an inning-ending double play.Swampscott would add a final run in the fifth when Hubauer hit a fence scraping homer to right to make it a 4-0 final.In the nightcap, Beverly got off to a quick start against Sullivan as Jordan Rawding led off the game with an infield hit. He went to second when Hunter Spencer reached on a fielder’s choice and later scored on the back end of a double steal.Peabody got the run back in the bottom of the first when Traverse Briana, one of six Peabody West players fresh off a run to the state Little League finals, doubled, went to third on a wild pitch and scored when Ben Irvine reached on an error.Beverly put together a serious threat in the second, loading the bases against Sullivan before Rawding grounded out to second to end the inning. It stayed tied until the bottom of the third, when Rawding met up with the potent Peabody offense finally.Rawding got the first two batters of the inning before Briana launched a towering homer deep over the left field scoreboard to make it 2-1. Christian Morales and Irvine followed with singles in front of Sullivan, who cleared the bases with a blast over the flagpole in dead center to suddenly make it 5-1 Peabody.That would prove to be all Sullivan needed as he was able to expertly pitch around four Peabody errors in his six innings of work. Morales came on to close things out with a relatively quiet seventh inning.