West Windsor North wins in return to varsity baseball
PRINCETON JCT. » Welcome back to Colonial Valley Conference varsity baseball West Windsor-Plainsboro High North!
Tuesday, the Northern Knights played their first game at the varsity level since 2018. They did themselves one better by defeating crosstown rival WW-P South, 7-3, on the road to open their 2021 campaign.
That marked WW-P North’s first varsity win since defeating Trenton, 11-3, at home April 30, 2018. It was the only victory the Northern Knights managed that season. Head coach Gary Gottlob’s club does not want that to be the case this time around.
“This is huge,” WW-P North junior John Pacifico said. “We definitely want this to be the first of many.”
Pacifico pointed the visitors toward their first win from the hill where the righty threw 5.2 innings of five-hit ball with four walks and five strikeouts.
The Northern Knights staked their pitcher a 2-0 lead in the top of the third inning when Jahan Kulkarni’s suicide squeeze bunt and Caleb Kempler’s run-scoring single plated Max Lasky and Kevin Cao.
Pirates starting pitcher, Caleb Kasof, another junior righthander, was equal to the task, matching Pacifico for five innings, scattering five hits, walking three and striking out eight, while allowing one earned run.
“The one thing that killed us was errors,” said WW-P South senior catcher Justin Guest, whose team committed three miscues. “This loss is tough. It leaves you with a bad feeling because you never like losing to your rivals.”
Guest did everything in his power to try to stem the tide. After Josh Raeter’s fourth-inning double, Quinn Ferri’s bunt single and Owen McCarron’s RBI groundout got the home side on the board, Guest came back in the bottom of the fifth to launch a solo home run over the left-field fence to tie the game at 2-2.
“That was my first one!” Babson College-bound Guest said. “I’d hit two home runs foul. I hit the fence three times. I even hit the yellow (liner atop the fence) and had the ball pop high into the air and fall back on the field. Not this time!”
Nor the time when he came to bat in the bottom of the seventh when he led off with another solo shot off reliever Kulkarni. Guest also had the first hit of the day for head coach Justin Ely’s squad when he doubled in the third inning.
But WW-P North answered Guest’s power display by scoring two runs off reliever Jason Carroll in the top of the sixth as Kempler tripled in Kulkarni, who had walked, then Kempler scored when a ball momentarily got away at the plate.
Pacifico came back out to the mound in the bottom of the sixth and almost finished that frame until A.J. Friedman walked on a close pitch with two outs and a runner on second base. After 93 pitches, Gottlob felt it was best to bring Kulkarni in relief.
“My spinner was really working today,” Pacifico said. “I was getting it over pretty consistently. I wanted to finish that last inning and thought I had the last batter I faced.”
Kulkarni got out of the sixth inning
jam unscathed, then helped his team’s cause with an RBI single in the top of the seventh. Northern Knights catcher Kole Dispensiere also was credited with an RBI when he and Matt Chi were hit by reliever Morgan Mayer to force in a run. WW-P North’s seventh run crossed on an error.
The insurance was necessary when Guest homered and Kasof, who’d moved to center field, singled
to open the bottom of the frame. Kempler came on in relief of Kulkarni, and using a fastball clocked between 85 and 87 miles per hour, retired the next three hitters in order to give WW-P North its first varsity win in three years.
WW-P North (1-0) 002 002 3 — 7 10 1 WW-P South (0-1) 000 110 1 — 3 7 3
2B: Guest, Raeter (WWS); 3B: Kempler (WWN); HR: Guest 2 (WWS); RBIs: Kulkarni 2, Kempler 2, Dispensiere (WWN), Guest 2, McCarron (WWS). WP — Pacifico (1-0); LP — JCarroll (0-1).