49ers hand BF 1st losses
Toolbox
By Tom Haley STAFF WRITER - Published: July 13, 2009
FAIR HAVEN — Bellows Falls Post 37 came to Bill Wood Field with a 13-0 record (11-0 in the league), but then got knocked over by a sledgehammer and pierced by a dart.
Fair Haven Post 49's Andrew Patch was the sledgehammer and Dan Brown was the dart as the 49ers dealt Bellows Falls its first two losses.
Patch was overpowering in the first game, striking out 10 in a contest abbreviated to five innings by the 10-run mercy rule as Fair Haven won 12-1.
Post 37 had to look at something vastly different in the second game, but Brown's slow serves were every bit as effective as he pitched six innings in the 49er's 7-4 victory.
Brown struck out only two, but he walked just one and hit a batter.
"Dan made them put the ball in play and we fielded and got him some runs," his catcher Ryan Gilbert said.
"Patch pitched like Patch today," Fair Haven coach Gob Godlewski said. "He was just overpowering. I haven't seen him pitch like that all summer."
He was just as impressed with Brown, who will only be a sophomore at Fair Haven Union High in the fall.
"He is going to be a heck of a pitcher," Godlewski said. "He was really composed. He never got rattled and I like that in a pitcher."
Bellows Falls coach Bob Lockerby told his team in the dugout that it still controls its own destiny with an 11-2 league record and five games remaining.
"This tightens things up but we are in control of what happens," Lockerby told the players. "Don't pout. Just get over it.
"You are still the same team you were when you were 13-0."
Post 37 travels to Brattleboro Post 5 for a doubleheader Tuesday.
The top four teams in the Southern Division make the eight-team state tournament at the Barre Town Rec Field and the 49ers improved their stock significantly by raising their league record to 6-3.
It was a bonus for Godlewski who said before the twinbill that he was just hoping to take one from BF.
"Bellows Falls is a great team. We had to bring our 'A' game," Gilbert said. "We showed them that we can beat anyone on any day."
Fair Haven 12, BF 1
(5 Innings)
Patch gave up a double to Justin Beebe leading off the game. Beebe stole third but was stranded as Patch struck out the side.
That set the stone as Patch piled up 10 strikeouts and limited Post 37 to five hits.
Bellows Falls starter Ben Hewitt retired the side in order in the first inning but Fair Haven scored in the second when Joe Beland singled home Karl Goodwin.
Bellows Falls pulled even in the third when Beebe singled, moved up on Zach Whitcomb's infield hit and scored on an error.
But Fair Haven took the lead for good in the bottom of that inning, a frame highlighted by back-to-back doubles by Gilbert and Sam Macomber. Allan White's bloop single scored Macomber with the second run of the inning.
Then the 49ers really went to work the bats, scoring five in the fourth and four more in the fifth to end it. The big blow in the fourth was a three-run homer by Goodwin that cleared the left field fence.
Nick Gendron relieved Hewitt in the fifth and was greeted by Gilbert's two-run triple that made the score 12-1 and ended the game.
Leading Fair Haven's 12-hit attack were Hewes, Gilbert and White with two hits apiece.
Beebe's two hits led Post 37.
Fair Haven 7, BF 4
Bellows Falls got the jump on the 49ers by scoring twice in the first, but Brown settled in, exhibiting that composure his coach made reference to.
The 49ers got one of the runs back in the second, but Tyler Russell's sacrifice fly to center scored Whitcomb to cushion BF's lead to 3-1 in the third.
The 49ers pushed runs across in the fourth and fifth to tie it.
Gabe Pozzi, the outstanding left-hander for Division III state champion Leland & Gray, had been matching Brown pitch-for-pitch, until the sixth when Fair Haven erupted for four runs.
The key blow in the inning was Gilbert's two-run triple, his third extra base hit of the day. Kurt Hewes and Goodwin also had hits in the inning.
Godlewski sent Hewes to the mound to protect the 7-3 lead in the seventh.
He gave up one unearned run, but no more as he struck out two.
"We've got to rebound," Lockerby told his charges.
Lockerby had plenty of praise for the 49ers.
"Give Fair Haven credit," he said. "They played and played and played. They threw strikes and made plays."
One of the best of those plays was by second baseman Beland on a ball to his right, robbing Brian Bashaw of a hit in the fourth inning of the second game.
tom.haley@rutlandherald.com
40