The Chaminade Flyers are the 2019 NSCHSAA Champions with a 3-1 victory over St. Anthony’s pic.twitter.com/czHcPb827e
— Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) May 27, 2019
As soon as tryouts started, Logan Koester knew this team would be special.
Scratch that, since the end of last season he knew.
The George Washington-commit that mowed through the entire Catholic League, put an exclamation point on an outstanding season with 7.2 innings in the Championship Game against St. Anthony’s which enabled the Flyers to capture their 17th NSCHSAA Title and first since 2015.
Early on, it appeared that this game would have a different outcome, though.
In the bottom of the fourth inning, Marco Ali started the inning off with a double to left field. After a lineout to Sawyer Duarte for the first out, Steven Rizzo ripped an RBI double down the left field line to give the Friars a 1-0 lead. Koester, a tough pitcher to crack, was able to bear down and end the threat without any further damage. That has been a hallmark of Chaminade pitchers this season, as they have not allowed any innings to snowball on them. A pitcher like Koester is a master at making the big pitches when he needs to.
The Flyers’ offense–which had been held at bay for the first four innings against Jake Barrett–woke up in the top of the fifth when Brendan O’Hara singled and stole second base. After a fly out to Cameron Leary in center, Aidan Umhafer drove a singe to center to score the tying run.
From that point on, both teams had ample opportunities to capitalize and take the lead. At no point was that more evident than in the bottom of the sixth when the Friars got a leadoff single by Anthony LoCurto and a walk to Rizzo to bring up Cameron Dunn. He grounded out allowing both runners to move up to scoring position with one out. Tyler Podolsky then laced one to second but it was caught by Duarte who had a chance to double off LoCurto at third. The throw got away from O’Hara, but not too far. The third baseman was able to retrieve the throw and throw out LoCurto to end the inning with no damage.
In the bottom of the seventh, the Friars once again had two runners on. This time it was from a two-out single by Leary and an intentional walk to Barrett. Koester was able to bear down again, this time on an infield pop out to Ali.
The game got away from the Friars in the eighth when reliever Joseph Okpych walked Jack Santini and Aidan Larkin to open the frame. Koester was asked to bunt, and it was a good one. Okpych picked it up halfway between home and the mound and unleashed an errant throw that went into right field–but the excitement was tempered by the collision between Koester and Jack Vallario at first base. Both players were down for an extended period of time, while the Flyers scored two runs to take a 3-1 lead. Both players wound up staying in the game.
No further damage occurred in the inning.
In the bottom of the eighth, Koester went back out and retired the first two batters before allowing a two-out single to Cameron Dunn. He reached his pitch-limit which forced Mike Pientkos to go to his bullpen. He called on Patrick Cullinan who coaxed a routine ground out to Larkin at short.
Like most of the season, it was a battle, but Chaminade flexed their muscle in this one. They reached the mountain top of the NSCHSAA this season.
Following the game, Larkin was named NSCHSAA Player of the Year and Koester earned Pitcher of the Year and Most Outstanding Player of the tournament.
Every season there appears to be one player that rises above all the others to put his team over the edge. In 2017 it was Chris Cappas, last year it was Logan O’Hoppe an this year it was Logan Koester.
Logan Koester was named Most Outstanding Player of the Tournament. He was the winning pitcher in today’s game pic.twitter.com/ZLdCd5Lsgw
— Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) May 27, 2019
From an Axcess Baseball perspective, it was a wildly entertaining season once again. For our haters–which there are many–I understand the preseason prediction of St. Dominic and St. Anthony’s meeting in the Championship did not pan out, but 50 percent hit rate will get you to Cooperstown so I’ll settle for that.
