Although pitching wins championships, great offense can get you there.
The 12U Long Island Baseball used their impressive lineup to power their way to a 12-1 victory over B1000 Seminoles-Kondak on Friday night at Cantiague Park. With the victory, they will now face Body Armor Titans on Saturday in the semifinals. The victory came as redemption after the Seminoles captured both games during the regular season.
A.J. Wayne got things going right away for LIB with a triple to right field in the top of the first. After T.J. Bradford was hit by a pitch, Nick Kramer‘s RBI ground out to shortstop scored Wayne to get them on the board.
Wayne was the starting pitcher for LIB and he was masterful. He fired a 1-2-3 first inning with two strikeouts to allow his offense to get back to work – and that they did. Their offense wasted no time in the second inning to break this game open. Angelo Forthofer led off with a double to center and advanced on a wild pitch. After a pair of walks to Ryan Bayer and Brandon Meyers, they forced a run on a fielder’s choice off the bat of Wayne. Bradford, an incredibly impressive young athlete, smoked a two-run single off the fence in left field that extended the lead to 4-0. Bradford – who’s three-year-old brother is the bat boy for the team – was slated to play varsity baseball as a 7th grader at Hewlett this year, according to his father. Once the score was 4-0, they never looked back. They added two more runs on a double by Nick Kramer and one each on doubles by Jack Degnan and Paul Brito.
B1000 got one back in the bottom of the second on an RBI double but at that point it was too-little, too-late as LIB poured on three more runs in the top of the third on a two-run double by Bradford – who was not retired in this game, and a long solo HR to left center off the bat of Degnan.
Wayne went back out for the bottom of the fourth and worked around a one-out single to Jake Barletta to fire the abbreviated complete game win.
They will have a challenge tomorrow facing Body Armor – who enters play as the No. 1 seed at 15-0, but they will catch a break as they will be missing Justice DeJong and Jayden Stroman as they are away at a tournament. The game will be at 6 pm at Cantiague Park.
