Thursday,
May 7, 2015
By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director
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Junior Ryan Morrone throw 6-plus innings of sparkling relief to lead Wood-Ridge to its first Bergen County Tournament win in 41 years, a 5-3 upset at Pascack Valley. |
HILLSDALE – To make an analogy for Group 1 Wood-Ridge in this year’s Bergen County Baseball Tournament, the Blue Devils were like the long shot in the Kentucky Derby allowed in just to fill out the field. They were supposed to take part in the pre-event pomp and circumstance before heading off to a disadvantageous post position never to be heard from again after the gates were opened.
After all, it has been 41 years since Wood-Ridge last won a county tournament baseball game.
Except this time, Wood-Ridge got a good jump out of the starting blocks and found itself at the head of the pack trying to hold off a favorite for the next mile-and-a-half or the next six-and-a-half innings in baseball terms. The Blue Devils’ stride was a little labored at times and they were leaking a little oil at the top of the home stretch when they were briefly caught from behind, but they recovered just in time for a 5-3 win over 13th-seeded Pascack Valley on Wednesday afternoon in Hillsdale.
“This is huge for Wood-Ridge. In years past we have always had the one big statement win somewhere along the way, usually it is in our league against St. Mary’s. This year St. Mary’s kicked our [butts] twice and we had to go find it elsewhere,” said Wood-Ridge head coach Mikey Carcich. “We were looking for that win that could kind of bring us a little notoriety out there because we do think that we are a pretty good program.”
If Wood-Ridge was going to pull the upset, it was better served playing from in front. Coming back against Pascack Valley ace Ryan Vasel would have been a tall order and, from a psychological standpoint, the Blue Devils could play loose while giving the home favorite the opportunity to tighten up as the innings rolled by.
With a one-out, two-run double to deep leftfield off the bat of Ethan Wilde, Wood-Ridge put itself in the lead, 2-0, just four batters into the game.
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Ryan Vasel went the distance on a 6-hitter, and gave Pascack Valley plenty of chances to mount a comeback. |
Trying to make that lead stick, however, was never going to be easy, especially since Carcich had to go to his bullpen before recording an out in the bottom of the second inning. Five of the first nine Indians to come to the plate reached via bases on balls and it cost Wood-Ridge a run in the first inning when Jack Fischer scored on Danny Corvo’s single back up the middle.
A 6-4-3 double play in that opening inning helped Wood-Ridge limit the damage, but when Riley Weiss and Alex DeRosa, the No. 8 and 9 batters in the PV lineup, were issued walks to start the second, Carcich called for Ryan Morrone, the junior right-hander who throws harder than his stature might suggest and who had a new trick up his sleeve when he took to the hill.
Having never thrown a change-up in a game before, Morrone threw a ton of them against a Pascack Valley lineup that grew anxious as the game wore on. Morrone got out of the second inning without allowing a run and then tacked on quality frame after quality frame to give his team exactly what it needed: length.
“We weren’t even supposed to be here so I wasn’t nervous at all, none of us were. We weren’t supposed to win so why be nervous? We were just out there having fun,” said Morrone, who threw six-plus innings of six-hit, two-run relief. “Once I was warmed up and we had that lead, I was ready to go. I wanted to make history.”
Wood-Ridge went up 3-1 on Wilde’s two-out, bad-hop single with two outs in the top of the top of the third and in the bottom of the inning, Morrone helped himself get out of trouble. He walked the leadoff hitter and left an 0-2 pitch up in the zone that Frank Cascio turned into a single, but Morrone picked the lead runner off second base and then set down the next two hitters on a flyball and a pop-up.
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Ethan Wilde's first inning, two-run double gave Wood-Ridge the early confidence it needed. |
Vasel (7 IP, 5 R, 4 ER, 6 H, 3 K, 2 BB, 1 HBP) did what he could to keep giving his team chances to come back. From the fourth inning through the sixth, Vasel retired all nine hitters he faced and the Indians scratched out single runs in the fifth and sixth to finally draw even. Ron Villone tripled to the opposite field to open the fifth and scored on Corvo’s groundball as Wood-Ridge traded a run for an out.
In the sixth, Morrone was within a whisker of getting out unscathed as he got the first two hitters before Fischer’s hard groundball to shortstop took a bad hop and turned into a single. Fischer went to second on an error on a pickoff attempt and then scored when Michael Pimpanella came up with a clutch two-out single to tie the game.
It’s a familiar story, the underdog on the verge of the upset instead falls just short and gets back on the bus with a handful of could-have-beens as the favorite moves on to take its preordained spot in the later rounds of the tournament.
It certainly looked like the momentum had switched to PV’s side after it tied the game and Vasel then retired to first two hitters in the top of the seventh to make it 11 straight Wood-Ridge outs. He even got ahead of pinch hitter Matt Veltri, who took the first two pitches right down the chute to fall behind 0-2.
“I was trying to be patient up there, but he threw those first two strikes and then I just had to try to find any way to get on,” said Veltri. “I was behind in the count 0-2 so I had to look for the next good pitch to hit. But then he threw four straight balls.”
Veltri’s walk saved an at bat for Anthony Latorocca, Wood-Ridge’s No. 9 hitter who had something to prove.
“I could hear them telling the pitcher that the No. 9 batter was coming up like I was going to be an easy out or something,” said Latorocca. “He threw me a first pitch fastball right down the middle. I decided to swing and I saw it go.”
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Jack Fischer reached on an infield single and scored with two outs to draw PV even at 3-3 in the bottom of the sixth inning. |
It did go, and it carried into the left centerfield gap. Anthony Trano, who re-entered to run for Veltri, had the luxury of moving on the crack of the bat with two outs. Carcich waved him around even though Trano was only a step or two around the bag when the cutoff man got the ball in short left, but the throw was up the line and Trano slid home with the go-ahead run. An added bonus was that the ball snuck through the walkway to the PV dugout, which meant that Latorocca was awarded the base he was going to (third), plus one more (home) and he strolled in to make it 5-3.
Pascack Valley did manage to put the tying runs on base in its final turn at bat when Cascio drew a one-out walk and Carson Weiss reached on a fielder’s choice with two outs, but Morrone (6+ IP, 2 R, 2 ER, 6 H, 7 K, 2 BB) struck out the final hitter of the game to clinch the win.
“We left 11 [runners] on base, we missed four signs and had two [runners] picked off when they weren’t going anywhere. We did not play well and they found a way,” said Pascack Valley head coach Will Lynch. “Vasel was Vasel and he was great out there. He has been doing that for three years for me, we just couldn’t find a way to help him out.”
Wood-Ridge (12-8) did find a way to win its first county tournament game since 1976 and Carcich, the son of legendary Emerson skipper turned Bergen Catholic assistant coach Bob Carcich, got his first after qualifying in three of the last five seasons. The Blue Devils will play No. 4 Mahwah on Saturday in the Round of 16.
“As a Group 1 usually we tell the kids that we are just happy to be here and to have some fun, but that shot [by Wilde] in the beginning of the game showed that we were here to win a game and move on in the tournament,” said Mikey Carcich. “I can’t say enough about this kid [Ryan Morrone] for coming in the game and throwing a ton of strikes and giving us a chance to win. He was great.”
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