Saturday, April 16, 2016
Five unearned runs aid Irish
By Steve wilaj
STRUTHERS
An unusual top of the first inning surrounded Vinny Lucente on Friday.
The Ursuline ace threw 30 pitches, struck out four Cardinal Mooney batters (one reached on a throwing error after a ball in the dirt), surrendered a double and fell into an early one-run hole.
But how the senior battled through the eventful top-half revealed something to his Fighting Irish head coach.
“He’s really grown a lot mentally,” Matt Weymer said. “I think maybe in another time, that might have really bothered him — throwing it around in the first inning.
“But he really [bore] down and kept us in the game until we could get some offense going.”
It was smooth sailing for Lucente the rest of the way, as he notched 11 strikeouts and Ursuline used a five-run fifth inning to down Mooney, 6-1, at Cene Park.
“It wasn’t too bad,” Lucente said of the first inning. “I just knew I had to keep my composure and my teammates would back me up.”
It took until the fourth inning for the Irish offense to get going, as Jimmy Kerrigan’s run-scoring two-out single off Mooney’s Jack Lynch tied the contest.
Ursuline (6-3) then scored five unearned runs in the fifth inning without notching a hit.
Two runs scored on RBI walks (one by Brice Bokesch and another by Kerrigan), one run scored when Vito Petrillo was hit-by-pitch with the bases loaded and two more runs scored when Gianni Quattro’s ground ball wasn’t fielded cleanly.
“We’re waiting for the offense to come a little bit, but you have to take what they give you,” said Weymer, whose team finished with four hits, led by Alex Schlosser’s two singles. “The fact that we’re winning while not hitting is good. But the bats will come.”
The way Lucente threw, the bats were barely necessary.
The Mercyhurst commit allowed just three hits and walked three. After allowing a first-inning double to Lynch, he didn’t allow another hit until Mooney (3-5) notched back-to-back singles with two outs in the seventh inning.
“The key was my fastball — they couldn’t touch it,” said Lucente, who picked a runner off first to end the game. “And then the slider was working really well too.
“I was just throwing strikes. They’re a good team, but I came to play.”
Mooney scored its lone run when Bryce Richey came home following an errant throw to first base after one of Lucente’s four first-inning strikeouts.
Lynch (88 pitches) went four-plus innings — allowing four hits, notching four strikeouts, walking five and hitting one batter. Freshman lefty John Mikos came on in relief and walked four batters in just one-third of an inning.
“It wasn’t like Ursuline was beating the ball all over the stadium,” Mooney coach Al Franceschelli said. “But anytime you strike out 11 times and walk 10 guys, it makes it tough to win. It’s almost a miracle that we were still in the game.
“It was a struggle trying to get the ball over the plate — I think it was a combination of our kids not throwing well and the zone being small. We just didn’t play well.”
Mooney heads to Stow for a game today while Ursuline hosts Kirtland in a doubleheader (3 p.m. and 5:30 p.m.) on Cene Field No. 3.