LEWISTON — After a tough loss to Erskine Academy on Friday, Leavitt took out its frustration Saturday against Lincoln Academy, topping the visiting Eagles 10-0 in five innings at a home-away-from-home game at Lewiston High School.
The victory moves the Hornets 4-3, while the loss drops Lincoln Academy to 1-5.
“We are really, really happy, we had a very tough loss yesterday,” Leavitt coach Chris Cifelli said. “I was really happy we could get right back after it. I was excited how mentally prepared for this game, both defensively and offensively.”
Julian Kirouac had a strong pitching performance for the Hornets, setting down the first eight batters in a row. He allowed two hits, struck out three and allowed one walk for the complete game.
He got out of a mini-jam in the top of the third when Gus Hunt singled and John Henry worked the count to draw a walk. He struck out Bradley Cross to end the frame.
“It was nice to have confidence in my (fielders),” Kirouac said. “Knowing that they are going to hit the ball and that’s okay because we are going to get outs from that. I don’t have to strike everyone out and do it all by myself.”
Leavitt took plenty of pitches in the first and drew a couple of walks. Lucas Perry drove in the first run with a sacrifice fly center to score Christian Callahan. Kirouac came into score when Tim Albert reached base on an error. Lincoln starter Baker Grover pitched out of the jam when Brian Hewett grounded back to him.
“Our starting pitching was very good and our defense needed some work,” Lincoln Academy coach Chris Perry said. “We are a young group and they are learning everyday. We are a very young team and they get nervous, but they are very capable. We executed a couple of plays well, but we need to knock down on the routine errors. We need to get rid of those.”
The Eagles had four errors in the game.
Grover had a 1-2-3 second inning before the Leavitt bats struck in the bottom of the third. The Hornets scored five times in the inning as Callahan opened with a double. The Hornets had five singles and all nine batters went to the plate. The inning ended when Zac Dymond tried to stretch a single into a double and was tagged out at second after the fifth run crossed the plate.
“I am really proud how we approached our at-bats the last three games,” Cifelli said. “We faced a lot of different styles of pitchers: some guys throwing a heavy ball and we have some guys nimble corners. Being able to extend at-bats and get deep into some counts. It doesn’t it earlier, but it shows up later and the kids are finally buying into. I think it’s working for us.”
In the bottom of the fourth, Hunter Williams came on relieve for Grover allowing the first four batters of the inning to reach base as Leavitt lead increased to 8-0. He induced Albert into a 1-2-3 double play. A single by Hewitt drove in the ninth run, while John Rousseau, who came into the game to pinch hit in the eight hole, drove in the 10th run
Kirouac found himself in another mini-jam in the top of the fifth when an Andrew Greenleaf fly ball was dropped by the right fielder. Greenleaf reached second on the error, and scampered to third on a wild pitch. Henry almost beat out a grounder to the shortstop to extend the game for the Eagles, but the throw just beat him.
“We haven’t ten-runned a team in a long time, that was a big deal to us,” Kirouac said. “Once (Greenleaf) got to third, things started to seem a little bit old-school in the way Leavitt seems to work. We like to throw away games sometimes.”
He also said he started to feel the nerves but knew he could trust his fielders behind him.
Lincoln was hoping another inning would allow them to work on some things.
“That’s what exactly what we were hoping to do,” Perry said. “We just came up a little bit short, it was so close. You have to give (Leavitt) credit, they hit the ball well, but it’s frustrating that we give them half their runs. We will get better.”
nfournier@sunjournal.com
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