Tom Meucci gets mobbed by his Northwest Catholic teammates after his game-winning single to beat Avon 8-7 in eight innings. Derek Turner/GameTimeCT
WEST HARTFORD >> Extra inning games and comeback victories have become a commonplace for the Northwest Catholic baseball team this season.
The Lions scored twice in the seventh to beat Conard on April 15. On Monday, Northwest and Watertown went back and forth for 12 innings and still haven’t finished. That suspended game will continue on Saturday, May 14 at 10 a.m.
And now Thursday.
It took a Tom Meucci walk-off single in the bottom of the eighth to beat Avon 8-7 in order to remain unbeaten at 7-0.
These games are starting to wear on coach Cory Carlson.
“All week,” Carlson said. “About a week and half straight of just really, I mean really, straight dodging bullets right now. Better to be lucky than good, I guess, but we are dodging bullets. Yesterday we dodged six errors and were still able to win and today you just saw that debacle.
“We were fortunate enough to be on the winning end of everything so far, Carlson said. “And I really don’t know how that’s happening, but we do have to tighten some things up and try to make it a little bit easier on ourselves.”
Northwest Catholic led 5-1 before Avon got to the Lions starter Justin Gallicchio for six runs in the top of the sixth to take a 7-5 lead. Gallicchio was making his first start since his opening day no-hitter after nursing a hamstring injury for two weeks.
“We wanted to be a little cautious with him getting him back,” Carlson said. “But we’ll see how he feels tomorrow and how it takes. But he showed a lot of positive signs. I’m sure he’s frustrated with the outcome obviously. But he’s a competitor and he’ll 100 percent bounce back next week.”
Rob Matson celebrates as he scores the game-winning run to defeat Avon 8-7 on Thursday. Derek Turner/GameTimeCT
Down, but not out. Northwest Catholic came back yet again.
Senior Tyler Rice took a lead-off walk in the bottom of the seventh followed by single from Jack Manzi and Luke Fox to load the bases. The back-to-back ground balls to second base got two runs in to tie the game at seven.
In the eighth, Rob Matson led off with a ringing double to the right-centerfield fence. After a strikeout and a steal of third, Meucci just had to get the ball to a place where it would be difficult for Avon to make a play.
And he did just that.
“Tom had a great day today,” Carlson said. “He had [four] hits at the plate today and it was a situation where I was glad to see them pitch to him. I didn’t think he was going to get an opportunity, but he was seeing the ball pretty well today. He got a good pitch to hit and he fortunately snuck in right under that kids glove.”
The senior right-handed second baseman drove a Will Boone pitch hard to the right side, just out of reach of Ian McDonald at second base to score the winning run. The team mobbed Meucci past first base and Carlson calmly walked out of the dugout, picked up the bat and flipped it in the air finally revealing a smile.
“If I got down in the count I wanted to shoot middle-away,” Meucci said. “I was ahead of the count and I just wanted to put the ball in play, because we had a runner on third, in scoring position. Just wanted to hit it hard, get him in and win the game.”
Avon took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first when Jeremy Zarwanski got Sean DelGallo home on a sacrifice bunt.
Northwest Catholic answered with two in the bottom of the first, most notably the first run, which came on a rundown between third and home. Matson broke from third on a short ground ball, but was able to out-run the fielder heading towards home and dive in safely.
The Lions added two more in the fourth when they got three hits and capitalized on a throwing error by the catcher trying to catch Colby Lytle stealing third. The other came in on a Matson sacrifice fly.
“I think we gave them a few runs,” Avon coach Jon Yolles said. “We made a few errors.”
Meucci led off the fifth with his second double of the game — he had four hits — and later scored.
In the Falcons big sixth inning they sent 12 batters to the plate, got six hits and scored six runs, but two Northwest Catholic errors proved to be the most costly.
“You can see how one simple error can change the complexion of the whole game,” Carlson said. “Because then you have two or three seeing-eye singles through the right side which our first baseman would be able to handle easily if he’s not holding a guy on.”
Only two of the runs in the inning were earned.
“I think we were pretty relentless and they were pretty relentless, too,” Yolles said. “It was a really evenly matched game and they did a nice job obviously at the end scoring that last run.”
Carlson pulled Gallicchio for Lytle in the seventh and he faced the minimum six batters over his two inning to pick up the win.
“It’s about not giving up,” Meucci said. “We get down in a hole, all our teammates are together, we’re all up on the fence. Never back down, never accept defeat and we just keep coming up for our team.”
Northwest Catholic 8, Avon 7
Avon: 100 006 00 — 7 8 1
Northwest Catholic: 200 210 21 — 8 14 3
(at Northwest Catholic)
Batteries: A — Kyle Emery, Will Boone (6/L) and Jeremy Zarwanski; NWC — Justin Gallicchio, Colby Lytle (7/W) and Tyler Rice.
2B: A — Justin Olson, Jeremy Zarwanski; NWC — Tom Meucci (2); Rob Matson.
RBI: A — Zarwanski, Ian McDonald, Chris Jacobs; NWC — Matson, Meucci.
SB: NWC — Matson (2), Meucci (2), Manzi, Hungeford, Lyttle, Farrell.
Team records: Avon 4-3; Northwest Catholic 7-0.
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