Late rally falls short for Posts 194-25

0
48

BEACON FALLS — The Prospect-Beacon Falls American Legion baseball team erupted with a late rally against Danbury on Tuesday at Woodland High School. It was too little, too late for Posts 194-25 though, as they fell to Post 60 in Zone 5 action by an 11-5 margin.

Despite the loss, PBF manager Jim Augelli was heartened to see his team swinging the bats well again.

“It was encouraging to see the bats finally come to life,” Augelli said. “When we pitch well we don’t seem to hit. When we are hitting the ball we don’t pitch well. It’s been that kind of season for us.”

The team has hit its share of bumps in the road this season. But no one is ready to give up the fight.

“We have gone through some tough injuries that have limited us from being 100 percent. But Kyle Georgia is battling through it and we just got our shortstop Ryan Mariotti back. Kevin Brennan is still out,” Augelli said. “But there is still a lot of baseball left and no one is giving up. We continue to play hard. We just need to catch a break.”

PBF starting pitcher Mike Masulli gutted out four tough innings, allowing three runs in the first on just one hit. That one hit belonged to D.J. Miller, who drove in the first run of the game and later belted a two-run double to increase the Post 60 lead at 8-0.

Trailing 4-0 in the bottom of the second PBF looked like it would break through with a run. Ryan McKay drew a one-out walk and Brian Langdon crushed a two-strike pitch into the centerfield gap.

With runners at second and third Danbury pitcher Anthony Nunez induced Mike Hardy and Anthony Ross into hard groundouts that retired the threat.

“When we don’t hit the ball the way we should it forces us to play perfect baseball,” added Augelli. “Unfortunately Masulli ran into some trouble in the first inning and they ended up with three runs on just one hit.”

McKay took over on the hill when Danbury loaded the bases in the fourth. Miller delivered a crushing blow belting a two run double to give Post 60 a commanding 8-0 advantage.

PBF began to bang the nails out as they chased Nunez from the mound erupting with four runs in the fifth. McKay and Anthony Scirpo slammed run scoring doubles in the inning. Mike Hardy sent two runs across the plate coming through with a two out hit.

Danbury tacked on three more runs to extend the lead to 11-4 before PBF struck again in their final at bat. Mike Diurno ripped a double and scored the fifth run of the game for PBF.

Langdon collected three hits for Posts 194-25 with Hardy and Diurno getting two hits each to pace the ten hit PBF attack.

“It was nice to see us start to hit the ball,” Augelli said. “We ended up with 10 hits but it certainly didn’t help digging the hole that we did. When you are having trouble scoring the last thing you need is to spot your opponent right from the start. That’s what we did today and we need to play solid defensively so we stop playing from behind.”