Westfield Babe Ruth Baseball 13-Year-Old All-Stars Dillon Bazegian (11) crosses home plate in Sunday’s regionals game. (Submitted photo)
MANCHESTER, N.H. – The Westfield Babe Ruth Baseball 13-Year-Old All-Stars may be hundreds of miles away, but they are playing as well as if they’ve been getting some good old-fashioned home cooking.
Westfield served up a win and loss in the opening week of play in the eastern regionals double-elimination tournament.
Eastern Massachusetts champ Plymouth built an early lead and held off Westfield 10-8 Sunday.
Westfield rallied from a five-run deficit with three runs in the third. Dillon Bazegian (3-for-4, double, triple, 2 RBIs, 2 runs scored), Sam St. Jean, and Matt Masciadrelli each hit doubles in the inning, the latter two of which scored a run. Aidan Dunn collected an RBI single and Kyle Roberts (3-3, run, 2 stolen bases) had a base hit as the Whip City’s All-Stars made it 8-6.
Plymouth reclaimed a four-run lead, until Bazegian’s seventh-inning, two-run triple closed the gap late.
Bazegian also reached base in the bottom of the second inning, scoring on Andrew Tobias’s RBI triple. Tobias scored on a wild pitch to draw within 4-3 early on. Westfield never gave up.
“We kept battling,” Westfield 13-Year-Old All-Stars manager John Bonini said.
Westfield was sensational in its opener, dispatching Central Maine 13-3 in a mercy-shortened, 4 1-2 inning contest Saturday.
State Republican Sen. Michael Knapik, & state Rep. Don Humason, Westfield-R, meet the Westfield Babe Ruth Baseball 13-Year-Old All-Stars near the turnpike prior to the team’s departure for the New England Regionals in Manchester, N.H. The two state officials wished the team good luck and handed them the state flag to proudly display at the ballpark. (Submitted photo)
Westfield rallied from an early 2-0 deficit, tying the game 2-all in the bottom of the first with RBI singles from Jack Yvon and Dalen Mochak.
In the second inning, Westfield exploded for six runs. Tobias walked, Dunn reached on an error, and both base runners advanced on stolen bases. Nate Bonini smacked in the go-ahead runs on a two-run triple down the left field line. Roberts followed with an RBI double, and scored after two wild pitches. Masciadrelli walked. Mitchell Longley and Bazegian hit RBI singles to make it 8-2.
Westfield tacked on five more runs in the bottom of the third. The big hits in the inning included two-run singles from Yvon and Mochak, and Longley’s RBI hit.
Longley pitched a four-inning, three-hitter. He struck out four batters, and walked none. Only one of the three runs he allowed was earned. John Daley (1 K) pitched a 1-2-3 inning in one inning of relief.
