WESTFIELD – Keene (N.H.) delivered Westfield its final blow in the Babe Ruth Baseball 13-Year-Old New England regional, knocking out Westfield 5-1 in the playoff round Sunday at Bullens Field.
Keene led from the outset when it jumped out in front with two runs in the second inning.
No. 9 batter Jared Summitt and lead-off batter Tucker Brown singled to lead off the second for Keene (4-0). With one out, Zachary Mooers drove in the first run of the game with a single to left field. Liam Yardley followed with a sac-RBI.
Westfield’s Kareem Zaghloul tags out a Keene base runner during Sunday’s Babe Ruth Baseball 13-Year-Old New England Regional playoff round at Bullens Field. (Photo by Marc St. Onge)
Keene tacked on some insurance in the fifth. Brown singled and stole second base. With one out, Mooers hit an RBI double to center field to make it 3-0.
Westfield (0-4) struggled to manufacture any offense for a good portion of Sundsay’s game. The hometown All-Stars had just one hit off Keene starting pitcher Jacob Kidney through five-plus innings, a lone single from the game’s first hitter, Jeremy McCormick.
Westfield finally got its second hit of the game in the sixth when Troy Hevey beat out an infield hit off reliever Kevin Putnam, scoring McCormick, who reached on a walk to begin the inning. Two runners were on at the time, thanks to Bobby Dellapenna “taking one for the team” when hit by a pitch. Dylan Arooth followed Hevey’s hit with a walk to load the bases. Keene turned to a second reliever, Connor Branon, to get a strikeout to end the threat.
Keene added another insurance run in the sixth, courtesy of a bloop RBI single from Alex Charles just past the first base bag.
It was a fairly quiet seventh inning as Branon forced three fly outs around a walk to Riley Sullivan.
In other playoff games, Pittsfield shut out North Providence (R.I.) 10-0, Trumbull (Conn.) blanked Burlington (VT) 11-0, and Newton clipped Tri-County (Maine) 12-8.
