LYNN — Starting the new season with a win was the goal for the Lynn English baseball team Monday night at Fraser Field.
The Bulldogs only scored two runs, but that was all it took for a 2-0 English win in its season opener over Malden.
“It feels great,” English coach Doug Mullins said after his first win as head coach of the Bulldogs. “These guys worked really hard in the preseason. We’ve already been riddled with injuries. We had two guys start in the outfield tonight that haven’t played outfield before. One of them had six putouts. These guys all stepped up. We had a lot of guys contribute.”
English scored twice in the bottom of the first inning, fueled by a leadoff triple, to claim an early 2-0 lead. From there, the Bulldogs let pitching and defense take care of business.
Starting pitcher Dax Billingsley tossed five innings of shutout baseball. Billingsley escaped Malden threats with runners in scoring position in three of his five innings of work. Jomar Moreta pitched two innings of relief and sealed the victory.
“Dax was in tough spots at times but he was able to bear down,” Mullins said. “It’s tough to pitch out of jams. Dax had runners on base a few times and he was able to get some huge outs. Same thing with Jomar. Malden had runners on first and second in the seventh (inning) and Jomar got out of that with a huge out.”
Wilbur Rosario led the bottom of the first with a triple roped to right field. An RBI single off the bat of Briston Maynard brought Rosario home for the first run of the game and a 1-0 English lead. After Billy Allen was hit by a pitch, Maynard came home on an RBI single from Juan Subervi. The Golden Tornadoes escaped the inning without further damage but trailed 2-0 after one inning.
“One of the main reasons for that was Wilbur turned a ground ball to right field into a triple,” Mullins said. “From the moment he got out of the box he never stopped running. He read the play and ran hard all the way to third. That’s how we got our run started.”
English’s offense cooled down after its hot start but Billingsley kept the Bulldogs afloat by keeping Malden off the scoreboard.
Malden’s best threat came in the top of sixth inning, when the Golden Tornadoes loaded the bases on English reliever Moreta. Moreta surrendered a pair of singles and a walk but escaped the jam with a fly-out to centerfield for the third out of the inning.
An English infield error with two outs, followed by a single, allowed Malden one last shot to climb back in the top of the seventh. Moreta retired the final batter of the game on a fly-out to centerfield to cement the 2-0 win.
English (1-0) is back in action Wednesday when the Bulldogs host Somerville.
“We don’t know much about them but we played them last year and it went to extra innings,” Mullins said of the Highlanders. “Every game is a big game for us so we have to be ready.”
