Tuesday,
May 12, 2015
By Cory K. Doviak
NJS.com Editorial Director
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Chris McClurg celebrates after his seventh inning single knocked in the game-winning run in Wayne Valley's 4-3 win over Pompton Lakes in the Passaic County Tournament final. |
WAYNE – With the game-winning run on second base, with first base open and with the clean-up hitter striding to the plate, Pompton Lakes head coach Paul Tanis decided to issue the intentional pass to Wayne Valley’s Mike LoPresti in the bottom of the seventh inning of the Passaic County Tournament championship game, which was tied.
From a baseball standpoint, there was no second-guessing the strategy. With one out, Tanis was setting up the possibility of a double play, putting a runner on base with a potential run that meant nothing and the added bonus was that he avoided pitching to LoPresti, one of the county’s top hitters. From a psychological standpoint, Wayne Valley head coach Jeff Hoover jumped all over the opportunity to challenge the next man up, Chris McClurg, to come through in the clutch.
“I said to him when they walked Mike, I said, ‘They want you! They don’t think you are good. I yelled that to him,” said Hoover, who certainly stoked the fire. “Then he got a good rip on it and as soon as I saw it hit I knew the game was over.”
The hit was McClurg’s single back through the middle just to the right of the second base bag. Pinch runner Joe Namendorf also saw it well, got a good jump off of second base and scored without as throw as Wayne Valley ended Pompton Lakes’ two-year reign as county champion with a 4-3 win on the campus of Passaic County Technical Institute in Wayne on Monday evening.
“When I was in the dugout I told the guys that if I got up, I was driving [Namendorf] in and we were going to win the game. You can ask them. I said it. I got it done,” said McClurg, who drove in half of the Indians’ runs in the game. “”It was a fastball, a straight fastball and I was jumping around before I even got to first [base]. I was ecstatic. This is great.”
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With this swing, Christian Ferrara knocked in all three of Pompton Lakes' runs. This was a three-run homer in the top of the fourth inning. |
The Passaic County final can sometimes take on the feel of a men’s softball game as the short porch in left field can turn routine flyballs into prodigious looking home runs. But with LoPresti, the senior right-hander who is heading to St. John’s next season, and Justin Wazaney, Pompton Lakes’ junior ace, facing off, there would be no slugfest.
Wazaney, a hard-throwing right-hander, walked the tightrope between wild and dominant as worked his way in and out of trouble through four scoreless innings. He left two runners stranded in the first, one in scoring position in the second, the bases loaded in the third and worked around Joe Pascucci’s leadoff single in the fourth to hang up the four straight zeros.
LoPresti, who was tickling 90 on the radar gun held by a scout stationed behind home plate, had no trouble through his first three innings of work. AJ Nadiroglu singled in the first and got to second on an outfield error with one out, but he was erased by a 6-5 fielder’s choice and Pompton’s next baserunner did not come until Nick McCarthy reached on a two-out error in the third that did no damage.
The sum total of Pompton Lakes' offense was generated by its first three hitters in the fourth. Jim Huber led off with a double in to the right centerfield gap, Justin Aug followed by drawing one of the two walks that LoPresti issued in the game and then Christian Ferrara unloaded on a knee-high fastball. Ferrara’s shot would have had a chance to go out in most parks across North Jersey, but at PCT it was long gone, a three-run blast that put the Cardinals out in front.
“This is a short park, so any flyball up in the air is going to go over [the fence]. After that happened my first baseman Joe Pascucci came out and gave me some motivational words and it pumped me up even more. My adrenalin started rushing,” said LoPresti (7 IP, 3 R, 3 ER, 4 H, 8 K, 2 BB), who went on to retire 12 of the final 14 hitters he faced. “I lost my command for that one inning, but I regained it back and I felt awesome for the rest of the game.”
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Mike LoPresti threw a complete game four-hitter to improve his personal record to 5-1 on the season. |
With LoPresti unfazed, his teammates took him off the hook in the bottom of the fifth by staying patient and executing precisely in key situations. Alex Kokos (1-for-2, R, 2 BB) hit one off the fence in left for a leadoff single and consecutive walks to Tyler Blumenstyk and James Konopinski (1-for-2, R) loaded the bases with no outs. LoPresti (1-for-2, RBI) lifted a sacrifice fly to get the Indians on the board, McClurg’s groundball to short scored Blumenstyk to make it 3-2 and Pascucci (3-for-3, RBI) singled back through the box to tie the game a set up a two-inning duel for all the marbles.
The sixth inning went by in a flash as both pitchers retired the side in order before Pompton scraped together a scoring chance in the top of the seventh. Ron Campo hit a leadoff single, stole second and got to third base with one out on Will Verrico’s sacrifice bunt. The Cardinals then sent up two pinch hitters, but LoPresti struck out the first one and the second, Nick Ilacqua, hit one on the screws but right at Blumenstyk, who gloved it eye-high in right field.
Blumenstyk’s final contribution was a leadoff single in the seventh before Namendorf came on to pinch run and moved up to second base on a wild pitch. Wazaney (6 1/3 IP, 4 R, 4 ER, 6 H, 5 K, 6 BB) got an out on a flyball to right and then issued the intentional pass to LoPresti before McClurg’s hit gave Wayne Valley its first Passaic County championship since 2010.
Pompton Lakes’ two-year run as county champion is over, but the Cardinals have proven that they have staying power even as a Group 1 school playing against the big boys. In the last three years, Pompton has won two state sectional titles, been to two state finals, won two county titles and got to this year’s final as the No. 6 seed even after losing two starting pitchers to graduation and Division 1 programs.
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Pompton Lakes junior Justin Wazaney struck out 5 in 6 1/3 innings. |
The Cardinals could very well go on another deep state tournament run starting next week and will have their top two pitchers, Wazaney and Aug, who got the win over Passaic County Tech in the semifinals on Friday, back to do it all again next year. Pompton is no longer playing above its level…this is its level.
“This team has exceeded my expectations 10-fold. They believe in themselves, they are a great team unit, there are no individuals on this team and the four seniors that we have are tremendous leaders,” said Tanis. “The best is yet to come and that may not mean a state [championship], but just the continuation of the tradition here. I will go and tell them that this has already been a magical season, but they will all look at me and say, ‘Coach, we should have won this game.”
Instead, it is Wayne Valley (16-4) that will go into the state playoffs as the reigning Passaic County champion.
“We have about a week to enjoy this and we have a couple of games to line up our pitching for next Monday and next Thursday if we can advance [in the state tournament],” said Hoover. “It is nice knowing that you have a title. If somebody jumps up and gets you in the state tournament, you have this already in your pocket.”
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