Sachem Mistakes Lead to Loss Against T-Birds

Sachem North left two runners on base in every inning but the first and made some costly mistakes in the field en route to a 5-3 home loss in the series finale against Connetquot on Thursday.

The game had a similar feel to Tuesday's 8-6 extra inning victory, where Brendan Garry crushed a three-run homer in the top of the eighth to give the Arrows (11-4, 13-4) the lead for good. But despite a number of opportunities, on Thursday the big hit never came.

"I thought we hit the ball okay, we just didn’t field well at all," said Sachem coach Tom Gambino. "We kicked the ball all over and gave them three runs. Twelve runners obviously hurts more, puts more pressure on the hitters, but we didn’t field the ball at all."

The loss prevented a sweep of Connetquot, and left Sachem two games behind Lindenhurst for first place in League II.

"We really don’t look at the last couple games," said Gambino. "We look more at how we played today. We’ve got to play better than today. You play like that, you don’t win. We expect to win, and today we didn’t deliver."

North squandered a number of opportunities with runners in scoring position, but hurt themselves even more in the field.

Sachem ace Alec Sole battled through a tough outing, pitching 5 2/3 innings, allowing five runs (three earned) on six hits, while walking four and striking out three.

"He didn’t have it but behind him, but you know you throw the ball away at home, can’t field the ball," Gambino said of his team's fielding mistakes. "We gave them some runs, he didn’t pitch great but we still had our opportunities to win."

After trading runs in the first two innings, Connetquot (9-6, 9-8) scored two runs in the third inning on three hits. Joe Petre led off the inning by beating out a ground ball to Michael Vitale at short, after he had momentarily lost his grip on the ball. He then moved to third on a botched pickoff attempt. Jim Guilamo drove him in with his second RBI hit of the day.

Guilamo went from first to third on a single by Andrew Jaccimo, and then beat out a relay throw by first baseman Nick Teta at the plate to push the T-Birds' lead to 4-2.

Though Sachem had the tying run on base five times, their best opportunity to tie the game came in the bottom of the sixth inning. Alec Sole's one-out double scored J.T. Kirk, who came on in relief of Sole on the mound. Steve Kowalski followed with a single, setting up runners on first and third and one out for Garry, who homered in the bottom of the first inning, was already 3-for-3 in the game.

The Arrows catcher smoked a 2-0 fastball down the third base line, but Jaccimo fielded it and started a 5-4-3 double play to end the threat.

North squandered a number of opportunities with runners in scoring position, but hurt themselves even more in the field.