LYNN— St. Mary’s baseball ace Bobby Alcock didn’t have his best stuff last week in the Clancy Tournament. Thursday afternoon’s game against Winchester was a completely different story.
Alcock threw seven shutout innings, leading the Spartans to a 8-0 win in their regular season finale at Fraser Field. Alcock allowed five hits and tallied 13 strikeouts in the winning effort.
“Bobby needed to bounce back,” St. Mary’s coach Derek Dana said. “He really wanted to get back on the mound. We wanted him to get back on the mound. It was good to see him have that type of performance. Now he has time to rest up again and everyone will be ready to go. Bobby was dominant today.”
The Spartans did the vast majority of their damage in the bottom of the third inning, when they plated seven runs with a string of hits and never looked back. St. Mary’s added one more in the fourth.
After two and a half scoreless innings, the Spartans turned the tide. Back-to-back singles from Josh Mateo and Kyle Ouellette started the rally. Colin Reddy (1-for-3, RBI) laced a RBI single, scoring Mateo with the game’s first run. A string of RBI hits followed with singles from John Mulready (1-for-3, RBI) and Lee Pacheco (1-for-3, RBI), and a two-RBI triple from Anthony Nikolakakis (1-for-3, two RBI). Pacheco raced home on a wild pitch Anthony Bono (2-for-3) scored on a groundout. When the third inning was all said and done, St. Mary’s held a 7-0 lead with full control.
“A lot of the guys started taking the ball to the opposite field,” Dana said. “Most of our hits were back up the middle, opposite field approach instead of trying to pull the ball. We started off trying to do that Wednesday (9-2 win at Arlington Catholic). It was nice to see.
“Anthony (Bono) has been on fire the past few weeks,” Dana added. “He’s putting the ball hard in play. Anthony had a couple big hits. Leydon had a few hits. That’s what we’ve been trying to do. The next guy just has to keep it moving. We can’t have weak at-bats.”
Ouellette reached on a Winchester infield error to lead the bottom of the fourth and advanced on a groundout. Aedan Leydon (1-for-3, RBI) scored Ouellette with a RBI single, extending the Spartans lead to 8-0.
That was more than enough run support for Alcock to work with, as the junior allowed just one base hit through the first five innings. The Sachems laced a pair of two-out singles in the top of the sixth but Alcock induced a groundout to end the frame. Winchester started the top of the seventh with back-to-back singles but Alcock forced a pop-fly and recorded two strikeouts to seal the 8-0 shutout win.
The Spartans close the book on the regular season at 13-7 with a two-game win streak. They’ll await the Division 2 North state tournament pairings, to be announced next week. St. Mary’s was bumped up to Division 2 from Division 3 during the offseason.
“We have to understand that every pitch counts,” Dana said. “If you lose your focus, the game could speed on you in a hurry. We’ll respect everybody coming in. We need to play our best game. Things happen on the field but mentally, when we come ready to play, we’re a pretty good team.”
