Swampscott baseball wins thriller over Fenwick

SWAMPSCOTT – With two dramatic swings in the bottom of the seventh inning, the Swampscott baseball team clinched a trip to the Division 3 North tournament in heart-pulsing fashion.Down to its final strike against Bishop Fenwick’s Mike LaChance, the Big Blue got a game-tying single from Frank Legere and then won a preview of a possible North tourney meeting, 3-2, on Mike Walsh’s first-pitch rip into left field.”This is big,” Swampscott coach T.J. Baril said. “We hadn’t played in 10 days and these guys stuck with it (Saturday). Fenwick is a great team and this was like a tournament atmosphere.”For six innings, LaChance had kept the Swampscott offense under wraps as he allowed one run on four hits. Pinch hitter Robert Serino ignited the Big Blue when he got aboard with an infield hit off the bench.Matt Videtta sacrificed Serino to second before LaChance whiffed A.J. Baker for the second out. He then got ahead 0-2 on Legere before the Swampscott leadoff man ripped a curveball into left to score the tying run.Sean O’Brien was intentionally walked, putting the winning run in scoring position. Walsh didn’t waste time in dispensing with the dramatics as he ripped a fastball to left, plating Serino just ahead of Mike Cipriani’s throw.”To win a close game like this, you can’t make mistakes,” Fenwick coach Russ Steeves said. “We made a couple and they took advantage.”It looked like the Crusaders might be the ones coming out with the win after they started fast against O’Brien via a 2-run homer from Mike Davis in the first inning. As it turned out, it would be all the offense that Fenwick got on the night.”Sean made one bad pitch and against (Davis) it’s going to be a home run,” Baril said. “But he settled in after that and held them at bay.”The Big Blue saw threats in the second, third and fourth innings go by the boards before finally getting to LaChance in the fifth.Baker started the inning by reaching on an outfield error. Legere then hit a ball deep in the hole at short to Ruggiero, who made a wild throw trying to get Baker at third, allowing the run to score.”David doesn’t make those mistakes very often,” Steeves said. “Those are the little things you can’t do in a game like this one was.”