LYNNFIELD — The No. 18 Bishop Fenwick baseball team put it all together when it mattered most Friday, winning a Division 3 North preliminary round matchup 7-4 on the road at No. 15 Lynnfield.
Anthony Marino powered the Crusaders on the mound, pitching a shutout through six and 2/3 innings. All in all Marino allowed four runs on eight hits and two walks with six strikeouts.
“His record doesn’t show exactly what he’s done,” Fenwick Coach Russ Steeves said. “He’s had great outings this season. We haven’t had a very strong offensive team. It was nice to see us break out, but we haven’t scored a lot of runs. So the games that he’s pitched like that, we’ve lost a couple of close ones.”
Junior Chris Faraca was on fire at the plate, going 3-for-4 with a triple, four RBI and a run scored.
“Faraca hasn’t hit for us all year really,” Steeves said. “He was our seven, eight, nine guy in the lineup for the whole year. Last year he was a great hitter. He played on my Legion team and hit .400 last summer. We took a shot, put him in the four hole and it paid off.”
Also getting the job done for Fenwick was Scott Emerson (1-for-2, two walks), who laced a two-run single in the sixth. Brandon Bloom added an RBI while Dan Reddick scored a pair of runs, with Bloom closing out the seventh with a strikeout.
It was a tough day for Lynnfield but, to the Pioneers’ credit, they never gave up, tacking on all four of their runs with two outs in the seventh. Blake Peters drove in a pair of runs while Nicholas Razzaboni and Even Balian each had an RBI.
Peters also threw four gutsy innings, allowing five runs on six hits, three walks and a hit batter.
“I thought our kids played hard,” Lynnfield Coach John O’Brien said. “There were a couple mistakes that cost us. Here’s a kid (Peters) who a few weeks ago got hit in the face with a line drive and he came back and pitched and hit (Friday). That’s amazing for him. I’m proud of him.”
Faraca started his day with an RBI single in the first inning and followed it up with an RBI triple in the third and scored himself on a double from Bloom to help Fenwick jump ahead 3-0.
A walk from Emerson and a single by Dan Reddick put Faraca in a familiar situation in the fifth, and he came through with his third RBI hit to plate them both and stretch the lead to 5-0.
In the next inning, Emerson capped off his day at the plate with a two-run single that drove in Alex Gonzalez and pinch hitter Mike Faragi to push the Fenwick lead to 7-0.
After cruising through six shutout innings and allowing just four hits, Marino started to come back to Earth in the seventh.
Razzaboni plated Spencer Riley with two outs to break the shutout and a few batters later Peters laced a single with the bases loaded to cut the lead to 7-3 and give Lynnfield life. Balian followed that with a double that would have scored two more if it had stayed in the park, but it only ended up plating Aidan Burke.
“That’s the kids and that’s my assistant coaches,” O’Brien said of the seventh-inning surge. “They wouldn’t let them die. I have a great group of assistant coaches. I’ve been very lucky since I’ve been here.”
But Steeves brought in Bloom at the right time and he got his strikeout to put the Pioneers comeback to a rest.
Lynnfield ends the season at 7-9.
The Crusaders (9-11) will travel to No. 2 Brighton Monday with top pitchers Bloom and Christian Loescher both ready to go.
