KENTS HILL — The early spring weather has not been kind to high school sports teams so far.
The Lisbon High School baseball team managed to get in its second Mountain Valley Conference game out of four scheduled Saturday, but had to travel an hour north to Kents Hill to play its home opener against Boothbay.
As the rain sprinkled down and the wind and fog invaded the field, the Greyhounds made quick work of the Seahawks, scoring 11 runs in the second inning en route to a 16-0 win in five innings via the mercy rule.
“So far so good,” said Lisbon coach Randy Ridley, whose 2-0 Greyhounds are slated to host Mountain Valley on Monday at 4 p.m. “We have two seniors and several young kids that have taken the bull by the horns and prepared well for this season. It is still very early and there is a long way to go.”
Lisbon put up three runs in the opening frame, highlighted by Neil LaRochelle’s inside-the-park home run to left field.
The hitting kept coming in the second, as 16 Greyhounds came to the plate. Mason Booker drove in the inning’s first run with a double, and LaRochelle added a pair of RBI singles in the frame as the lead grew to 14-0.
“We hit good, and we wanted to get out of here as soon as we could,” said LaRochelle, who finished the morning 3-for-3. “It is hard to not have field time, and you just can’t do much in the gym. But, so far things have worked out pretty good. We wanted to get off strong and get that momentum going.”
On the mound, Lisbon righty DJ Douglass was in command. He walked Boothbay’s Owen Barter with one out in the second, but quickly picked him off first base. Fox Elder also walked for the Seahawks to lead off the fifth. But, Douglass finished strong, striking out nine and tossing a no-hitter by facing just one hitter over the minimum.
“It is important to get off to a quick start because I am a believer that if you let a team hang around and get confidence they will start making plays,” Ridley said. “Getting out quickly set the tone. DJ pitched a heck of a game.”
Ridley has tried to mix things up in practice, with nearly all of his team’s sessions taking place inside the gym.
“We do a whole bunch of drills, we hit every day. We are working on situational work, game-related things,” said Ridley, who managed to get the Greyhounds outside earlier this week. “On Monday we were able to get on our field and we played a game. We play games inside, too, just to break up the monotony of being in the gym.”
Nick Ferrence and Justin Le each went 2-for-3 at the plate for Lisbon, while Hunter Brissette reached base in all four of his at-bats and scored three runs. Noah Austin, Douglass and Booker each added a base hit.
Barter started on the mound for Boothbay (0-3), going 1 2/3 innings on six hits, four walks and four hit batters. He permitted 12 runs.
Mark Bayaka tossed a third of inning (two hits, one walk, two runs), while Hunter Crocker finished with two solid frames (two runs, three hits, one strikeout).
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