Former St. Raphael standout Aldridge guides Post 10 to win
WEST WARWICK — It wasn’t necessarily the prettiest of outings, but Colin Gauthier did enough on Thursday afternoon to help guide Collette Riverside Post 10 to a 14-6 win over Post Two in Game 1 of a doubleheader at McCarthy Field.
Fueled by steady, consistent offense from his teammates, which included a seven-run top of the seventh, the southpaw was able to record every out but one on the mound, racking up half a dozen strikeouts in the win.
“Colin’s been great all year. He’s been going the whole game or close to it pretty much every start. We need that, especially recently,” head coach Dylan Boisclair said, after reliever Aaron Massey recorded the game’s final out.
“We had a lot of games back-toback-to-back, so we were a little short on pitching, so it was good to settle back in here after having a week off and rest some arms,” said the visiting skipper. Offensively, it was Post 10’s most productive game this summer, with players up and down the lineup cashing in against Post Two starter Jacob Organ and later, reliever Colby Knott.
“Everybody was contributing,” said Boisclair.
“A lot of new guys were stepping up. Guys weren’t really trying to do too much. When we had guys in scoring position, they were just trying to put the ball in play. When we had guys on third, they were just trying to hit a sac fly and stay true to themselves with their swing. Just got the job done,” he said.
Brenden Aldridge drove home two of his three runs in the first, helping stake Post 10 to a lead they would never surrender. Massey, who plated the game’s first run on a sacrifice fly in the first, added to his RBI total with a run-scoring groundout two innings later. He would also double in the fifth and single in the seventh. Catcher Andrew Rudecindo had a big day in the box as well, connecting for a pair of RBI triples.
“Definitely something we needed. Some guys were a little down on confidence, so it was good to have this game, get their confidence going again,” Boislciar said. Organ labored through six plus innings of work for the home team before being replaced by Knott in the top of the seventh following a leadoff walk to Massey. Though Post 10 was able to score off of him in every inning but one, Organ managed to keep his club in the game until the visitors’ bats erupted in the seventh.
Kyle McCann drove home the team’s first run in the first, singling to right to bring home Kyle Brown, but was picked off of first base moments later for the third out. He later singled home his second run of the day in the third, making it a 5-2 game at the time.
Knott came on in for relief with a runner on first and no one out in the top of the seventh, with Post 10 holding a 7-4 lead at the time. After loading the bases, he was able to strike out, Jonathan Baer, but ran into trouble from there on. A walk to Elliot Vadnais made it 8-4 before consecutive two-run singles form Jake Lefort and Nick Lemire helped put the game away for good.
Matt Gowdy would get a pair of runs back for Post Two via a two-run double in the bottom of the seventh, but it was not nearly enough in the end, with Massey getting Organ to ground out to third to end the game.