It was another entertaining day of baseball at Moriches Complex in day 3 of the Town of Brookhaven tournament. As I suspected, this quickly went from a recreational summer tournament to an intense revisiting of deeply rooted rivalries and I love it.
The passion that was on display yesterday is not typical for a tournament in July that includes several players that have already graduated. So much so, in fact, that Friday’s rainouts initially meant no playoffs for the tournament but enough coaches voted for it so Monday will now feature semifinals and finals.
At 3pm, I covered Babylon and Center Moriches. This is a rivalry matchup that has been completely one-sided in recent years due to the unprecedented success of Center Moriches. Babylon has always been a quality team, but last year and 2018 was a non-stop party for the Red Devils of Center Moriches. This year was different, as many of the names you heard about so much are now in college – i.e. David Falco, Matt Alifano, Andres Auffant, Alec Maag, Brad Sakellarides, Liam Pulsipher, so this was a new era for CM. They were never going to be a pushover, though, as they still have some holdovers from last year’s team including Marist-commit Robert Copozzi, ace Jordan Falco and SS Liam Pulsipher – who will be a Division-I player.
They faced a tough customer in Adelphi-commit Bobby Molinaro. He was on top of his game. He wound up striking out 11 over six dominant innings. Center Moriches took a 1-0 lead in the second inning on a wild pitch that scored Hunter Hassett, but Molinaro was able to bear down after that.
The Babylon offense went to work, although they did benefit a bit from shoddy defense. In the bottom of the third, A one-out walk to Ankur Singal was followed by back-to-back hits by Cristino Tufano and Molinaro to load the bases for Jack Layton. He drew a walk to tie the game at 1-1. A ground ball to second should’ve been an inning-ending double play but the throw went into left field to score two runs and open up a 3-1 lead.
Molinaro did his best work in the top of the fourth after he allowed a bloop leadoff single to Hassett. He then walked the next two batters but struck out three in a row to end the jam.
The Panthers appeared to break it open in the fifth when Nick Tuccillo crushed a two-run double to right to open up a 5-1 lead. They added another run on an RBI single by Krause.
The Panthers went to the bullpen needing just three outs to secure the victory. It did not come easily, however. A leadoff walk to Falco followed by an RBI double by Copozzi made it 6-2 with no outs. The following batter, was retired, but consecutive singles and consecutive wild pitches brought in two runs and made the lead that much less comfortable.
Babylon went to the bullpen again calling for the lefty, Tuccillo, but he walked the two batters he faced to force another pitching change. This time it was the hard-throwing freshman Tufano. I first met him at NYBA camp in 2016 when he was in fifth grade and he was playing up two years and still dominating. It’s safe to say he has only progressed since that time. He struck out the first batter he faced on three fastballs but then came up Jordan Falco. He fisted one to third base. The third baseman opted not to tag the runner, but to make the long throw across the diamond. It was a bang-bang play at first, the umpire called him out and that was it. The game ended in a 6-5 final. Babylon celebrated as it broke a long streak against Center Moriches.
In the 5:45 game, Longwood took on Connetquot. These teams faced eachother in the Suffolk AA semifinals last seasons with Connetquot winning Game 3 in a close battle. But the one game Longwood won was with Tommy Ventimiglia on the mound. He’s one of the best pitchers on Long Island and a very promising prospect, standing at 6’4 with a fastball that touches 90 MPH and outstanding command. With many eyes fixated on him, it was Connetquot’s starter, junior Mike DeFilippo, who shined brightest.
The rising senior was unflappable, throwing a four-hit shutout with four strikeouts against a very talented Lions lineup.
Ventimiglia showed a lot of great characteristics, but the T-Birds did get to him in the fourth inning on a sac fly off the bat of Mike Barbara to score Matt Tringali, who led off the inning with a walk.
In the fifth, they loaded the bases with one out. After a strikeout, Ventimiglia allowed a two-run single through the left side to his future Stony Brook teammate, Matt Brown-Eiring to score Ricci and Wilkinson. That was the end of his day.
The sixth inning was a bit of a slog as Nick Classie came on and struggled with his command, walking five and allowing a single to open the game up at 5-0. DeFilippo was not to be denied a complete game as he waited out the long inning and promptly fired a 1-2-3 sixth inning and allowed just a single to Justin Classie in the 7th inning before slamming the door.
It was a very impressive showing, and one that shows you truly can’t predict baseball.
