#MIDDLEBURY #PHS
Connor Sullivan scores a run in the first inning Wednesday in Southbury against New Milford, but the Panthers left the bases loaded and went on to drop a tough 10-2 decision to the Green Wave. (Ken Morse photo)
By Ken Morse Special to the Middlebury Bee-Intelligencer
Two baseball facts are undeniable: Good teams don’t win every game. and bad teams don’t win championships. Pomperaug High School has a good baseball team.
They didn’t start the season 9-2 by accident. They did it with a consistent offense that scored six runs in an inning three times in the first nine games. They even did it facing adversity in a ninth-inning comeback victory.
Over the past two weeks the Panthers have stumbled, dropping four of the last five games, but the alarming part is they have scored only five runs over that stretch. So what has changed?
Confidence is the great equalizer. The Panthers have lost a little bit of the swagger in their step. They are the same team, with the same lineup; they just don’t have the same attitude.
Pomperaug needed a reason to believe again, and Connor Sullivan delivered that in a big way Monday, throwing six innings of no-hit ball at New Fairfield. The Rebels got a one-out double from Sean King in the seventh to score Brian Magee before Grant Wallace came on to slam the door on the 3-1 win.
Sullivan finished his day on the hill going six and one-third innings, allowing one hit and one run, and striking out seven. Wallace came to the rescue, going two-thirds of no-hit relief with a strikeout to earn the save.
The Panthers found their bats in the process, with Matt Brophy getting two hits with two runs scored and Nick Hebert adding two hits and two runs batted in. Josh McGettigan also had two hits with an RBI to complete the Pomperaug attack.
“It’s like we are two different teams,” said Pomperaug head coach Mike Eisenbach. “We came out with a lot of intensity and emotion against New Fairfield and came away with the win. Other games, it’s like we have no energy. It’s very frustrating from a coaching standpoint because we still are a very good team.”
Pomperaug got behind the eight ball right away when New Milford hung three runs on the board in the first inning Wednesday. The Green Wave went on to a convincing 10-2 win, dropping the Panthers to 10-6 on the season.
“New Milford came out swinging,” said Eisenbach. “We didn’t even get up yet and we are chasing three runs. That’s a difficult position to put yourself in. Then we have a chance to get back in the game and we can’t put together a timely hit.”
Sullivan walked to lead off the bottom of the first inning with Pomperaug looking up at a 3-0 deficit. Brophy singled to center, and Wallace was hit by a pitch to load the bases with no outs.
Hebert and Brian Dagostino hit popups that invoked the infield fly rule, making both batters automatically out. Andrew Minchella singled in Sullivan to make it a 3-1 game before New Milford pitcher Tyler Hansen got a strikeout to get out of the jam.
Wallace surrendered a run in the third and two more in the fourth before Jake Veillette came on in relief to try and hold back the Green Wave attack. McGettigan doubled and scored on a single from Ryan Loiselle in the fourth to cut the lead 6-2.
Sullivan and Brophy singled with no outs in the fifth as Pomperaug was poised to get back in the game but the timely run-scoring hit never came as Hansen again was let off the hook.
New Milford piled it on after that, plating two more runs in the fifth and seventh innings to complete the 10-2 win as the Green Wave stayed very much in the SWC hunt improving to 10-5 and 7-2 in the conference.
Pomperaug was back in action Thursday at Barlow and will conclude the regular season next week with games at home on Monday with Masuk and Tuesday with Immaculate before finishing up at home Thursday against Oxford. The South West Conference quarterfinals will be next Saturday, and the semi-finals and finals will be played the following week at Penders Field in Stratford.
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