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No day at the Beach
Point Pleasant Beach uses grand slam, big inning to pull away from Woodstown in Group 1 semifinals
GROUP 1 SEMIFINALS Pt. Pleasant Beach 15, Woodstown 6 Pompton Lakes 3, Cedar Grove 2
By Riverview Sports News
POINT PLEASANT BEACH – If history has taught Woodstown baseball anything in the playoffs the last six years it’s that Point Pleasant Beach is a tough out.
The Wolverines twice answered Garnet Gulls attempts to pull away from Monday’s Group 1 state semifinal game – once to take a lead and once to get back within one – but a third time proved to be too much.
Carson Pfeifer’s grand slam highlighted a seven-run fifth inning that lifted the Gulls to a 15-6 win. They’ll now meet Pompton Lakes in a rematch of last year’s state final, 4 p.m. Sunday at Rutgers. Woodstown finishes at 21-9
“We really couldn’t stop them,” Wolverines coach Marc DeCastro said. “I counted 16 hits, we walked them six times, they had 22 base runners in six innings, so you’re really not going to win games like that.
“They’re a talented hitting team. They’re difficult to get out. We tried to throw a bunch of people at them in different looks to see if one stuck, but none really did.”
Beach (19-6) scored three in the home first to take an early lead, but the Wolverines rallied for four in the second to go ahead 4-3. Talyn Priore had a two-run single, Noah Williams doubled home the tying run and Walker Battavio’s RBI single gave them the lead.
But the Gulls answered with three in the bottom of the inning and added a single run in the third to go up 7-4, but the Wolverines pulled within one in the fifth when Luke Fraley and Ty Coblentz scored after the Gulls misplayed Drew Sutton’s single. Priore, Sutton, Battavio and Blake Rodriguez all had two hits apiece for the Wolverines.
“I told them at the end of the game if a 15-6 loss can be indicative of why they got where they got, then this was it,” DeCastro said. “All year long they kept answering. There was never really a game where they didn’t show up when things got rough.
“As much as that was the case during the year, in the playoffs when they were playing their best ball, they weren’t losing at any point in the four games in the South Jersey tournament. There was never a time they were down, they played all four games at home, and then they go on the road, they’re down 3-0 in the blink of an eye and they fight back to 4-3 the next inning. If there’s a reason that you can point to a loss and say this is why you won (during the year), the 3-0 to 4-3 and 7-4 to 7-6 is pretty indicative of that.”
Dante Spina got the Wolverines out of the third inning and pitched a clean fourth. They had hoped he could give them another good inning before going to Sutton down the stretch, but the Gulls got to him like no one has in his previous five outings.
The Gulls sent 11 batters to the plate in their big inning. They loaded the bases on two singles and a walk, then Mason Sesny sent a one-out floater into short left field to score the first two runs. The Wolverines changed pitchers after intentionally walking Danny Lubach to reload the bases, Brody Powers hit a sharp single to short off Sutton that scored another run and then Pfeifer launched his slam. Sesny had four RBIs in the game, Pfeifer had five.
“We went into the second inning down 3-0, but knowing we were going to have to hit in order to stay in the game,” Coblentz said. “Almost everyone in the lineup understood that and it was a great feeling taking the lead.
“We gave our pitching a shot to keep it close again and again. Can’t blame it on them, though. There were many mistakes and missed opportunities through the entire game. We were battling as much as we possibly could. I could not be more proud of this team and how we ended even though it didn’t look good on the scoreboard.”
Pt. Pleasant Beach 15, Woodstown 6
WOODSTOWN
PP BEACH
Walker Battavio, p
3021
Tommy Conroy, cf
2320
Luke Fraley, 3b
2100
Mason Sesny, 2b
4334
Ty Coblentz, c
3100
Daniel Lubach, c
3222
Drew Sutton, rf
4021
Brody Powers, lf
5133
Tommy Tucci, ss
2100
Carson Pfeifer, 3b
3115
Blake Rodriguez, 1b
2120
Antonio Acevedo, ss
4110
Talyn Priore, cf
2122
Thomas Slobiski, dh
4120
Noah Williams, lf
2111
Dylan Ryan, 1b
4120
Colton Williams, lf
1000
Davin Marquez, rf
4121
Chase Harding, dh
3000
Woodstown
040
020
0-
6
9
0
PP Beach
331
071
x-
15
18
0
2B: Mason Sesny (P), Daniel Lubach (P), Brody Powers (P), Thomas Sloiski (P). HR: Carson Pfeifer (P)
Riverview Sports News 