NS suffers first defeat

Classical scores twice in seventh to earn road win

NORTH SMITHFIELD — The North Smithfield baseball team had been simply dominant in its first four Division III games and a non-league game against Blackstone-Millville.

The Northmen, who dropped down to DIII after some lean seasons in Division II, had outscored their first four league opponents by 36 runs, to go along with a mercy-rule victory over BMR.

But, Monday afternoon against a Classical team they blew out last week, the Northmen simply didn’t pitch, hit or play defense at a high enough level to stay undefeated. Classical pitcher Juan Reynoso threw a complete game, while the Purple scored twice in the top of the seventh against reliever Trevor Pascoe to secure a 6-5 D-III road win.

“We beat ourselves,” North Smithfield coach Jon Leddy said. “Not to take anything away from Classical because I knew it was going to be a tough game because we’ve had some tough battles with them up in D-II. You saw what happened. We had three unearned runs in the first couple of innings and we made some mental mistakes.

“Never mind the physical errors, the mental mistakes are very uncharacteristic of our group this season. I don’t know what it was, but we weren’t mentally ready to play in the first inning.”

North Smithfield (4-1 Division III) was essentially done in by a physical error. Classical’s Christian Sanchez tied the game with a single to right field to plate Chris Genao. Reynoso stopped at second on the play, but the ball got away in the outfield and the pitcher advanced to third.

That proved to be important because senior Roberto Reyes followed with a sacrifice fly to left field to plate Reynoso, who struck out a pair of batters in the seventh inning to secure the win.

“First year down in D-III, so far we’ve had three 10-run wins, so a loss can put a team in their place,” Leddy said. “I don’t think this is a type of game that can help us. I think this set us back a little with the mental mistakes and stuff like that. Aloss can help you refocus and make you realize it’s going to be a tougher road than you thought.”

Classical (5-2 Division III) is now in a tie for second place with the Northmen behind undefeated Mt. Pleasant, which comes to North Smithfield next Monday. The Purple received a pair of hits and a pair of RBIs from Sanchez, while lead-off hitter Josiah Kim scored twice.

The Northmen’s problems started in the first inning when Kim worked a walk against starter Devin Albino. Awild pitch moved the senior into scoring position and he scored on an ill-advised throw across the diamond by Jack Losardo.

“I don’t harp on the physical errors because everyone makes them,” Leddy said. “I say a lot of the physical errors are the result of mental errors because you don’t know what you should be doing with the ball in a situation. You panic and rush things and errors occur because of that.”

The Northmen ran themselves out of a scoring chance in the opening inning following a lead-off double by Chris Matulaitis, but the home side got to Reynoso in the second inning.

Catcher Jacob Forbes, Losardo, Pascoe and Cullen MacDonald all delivered singles and all four scored runs to put the home side up 4-1. Reynoso stranded Matulaitis at second and then Northmen didn’t have another base runner until the sixth inning.

“I think he had a five-pitch inning and a six-

pitch inning in the middle of the game,” Leddy said. “I think guys were trying to do a little too much and take it on themselves to help the team. I don’t think they everyone was trying to jack it out, I just think they lost their focus. They were forgetting their approach at the plate.”

Classical, which took advantage of a throwing error to tie the game in the second, had chances to score against Pascoe in the fourth, fifth and sixth innings, but it was the Northmen who retook the lead.

Forbes hit a one-out single in the sixth and was pinch run for by Michael deRonde, who advanced on a Losardo single and a wild pitch. Albino hit a sacrifice fly to score the speedy sophomore.

Classical answered with a pair of runs in the seventh to secure the victory, as the Northmen look to bounce back Tuesday afternoon against Hope.