The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
New Canaan’s offense lighting up the scoreboards
The scorekeeper for New Canaan was busy last week.
In all three games the Rams played, the scoreboard got lit up, with New Canaan coming out on top twice.
New Canaan beat Norwalk 9-7, lost to Ludlowe 16-12 and defeated McMahon 15-14.
If you are keeping track at home, that is 36 runs for the Rams and 37 runs against, but more importantly, they finished the week 2-1.
New Canaan had scored 49 runs in its previous 12 games before last week, which included two games where the Rams put up 10 and 11 runs.
The win over McMahon was as wild as baseball games get.
The Rams trailed 7-0 after the top of the first inning but busted out the bats right away, scoring eight in the bottom of the inning.
As darkness set in, Ben Sarda’s single in the bottom of the ninth gave New Canaan the dramatic 15-14 win after nearly four hours of baseball.
The win kept New Canaan (9-6, 7-4 FCIAC entering Monday’s play) right in the thick of the FCIAC playoff race.
GIANT SLAYERS
If you are a team that happens to find itself in the top five of the GametimeCT state poll, you would be wise to avoid games against Montville.
A week after knocking off then No. 3 Holy Cross 5-3, the Indians beat No. 2 Waterford 7-1 last week in an ECC D-II game behind a one-hitter by freshman Griffin Pontbriant.
Montville (10-3), which has now won six of its last seven games, has been sitting just outside the top 10 most of the season despite the marquee wins.
Pontbriant used a steady mix of two-seam fastballs and sliders, not allowing Waterford a hit until the sixth inning.
It turns out, baseball runs in the Pontbriant family.
Griffin’s father, Matt, played at St. Bernard’s in Montville before being drafted by the Seattle Mariners in the 65th round of the 1990 MLB June Amateur Draft, but chose to attend Eastern Florida State College, instead.
A year later, he was again drafted, this time by Pittsburgh Pirates in the eighth round.
He played in the Pirates system through 1996, reaching the AA with the Carolina Mudcats.
IN THE WIN COLUMN
The Joel Barlow baseball team has suffered through a brutal season so far but the Falcons finally got on the right side of an outcome last week.
Barlow picked up its first win, 9-4 over Stratford, aided by a five-run top of the seventh.
Tiernan Lynch and Clark Gilmore each had two hits and two RBI and Kyle Andreoli had two hits and one RBI for the Falcons
NO-HITTER WATCH
The no-hitters kept rolling in last week.
UConn-bound Waterford ace Mike Burrows struck out 16 batters and didn’t allow a walk as Waterford defeated Norwich Free Academy, 6-0 April 30
Ridgefield sophomore Matt DeLuca, making his first start in over two weeks, threw an 86-pitch no-hitter with six strikeouts and two walks in a 4-0 victory over New Milford in FCIAC-SWC crossover action May 2.
Finally, Jake Ranney of Lyman Hall struck out nine, not allowing a hit to Wilbur Cross in a 9-1 victory.
As always, please send your team’s no-hitters to us at GametimeCT.
It did not go the full seven innings, but East Haven’s Nick Furino tossed a no-hitter for five innings in a 10-0 win against Harding.