The Everett High baseball team concluded its 2010 campaign by splitting its final two games of the season last week.
Coach Joe Marchese’s Crimson Tide defeated Triton Regional 4-2 last Wednesday in a game played on the diamond at Bentley College.
Joe Saia was the starting pitcher for Everett and tossed five strong innings in which he allowed just five hits, walked two, and yielded the two enemy runs. Crimson Tide ace reliever Chris DiNapoli came on for the final two frames and gave up just one hit to pick up the save.
The Crimson Tide gave Saia all the runs he would need with three markers in the opening inning and then tacked on an extra insurance run in the fifth. A number of Everett players contributed at the plate: Chris McCarthy had an RBI single, scored a run, and stole a base; Matt Cafarella had a hit, two walks, two stolen bases, and scored a run; Dan Concannon delivered an RBI single and scored a run; and Shaun McGrath accounted for a run with an RBI base hit.
On Sunday the Crimson Tide traveled to St. John’s Prep in Danvers to make up a previously postponed affair. Marchese treated the contest as a warm up for the coming state tourney, which should start later this week, by using his four primary pitchers, McGrath, DiNapoli, Saia, and Zerif Pajatevic, to give all of them some work in anticipation of the tourney.
Everett jumped out to a 3-0 lead against the Prep’s top pitcher, who was hitting 90 m.p.h. on the radar gun, but a four run rally by St. John’s in the fifth, aided primarily by bases on balls from Everett pitching, propelled the Prep to an eventual 7-4 victory.
“We’ve had a very good year and I think we’re ready for the tournament,” said Marchese, whose squad won eight of its last 10 games after starting the first half of the season at 5-5.
The EHS baseball team will play at Newton South in the opening round of the MIAA Baseball Tournament. Everett is the No. 9 seed with a 13-7 record. Newton South is the No. 8 seed with a 14-6 record