Suns handle the Sharks on Father’s day following the flood

PITTSFIELD – After a Saturday night where the flooded Housatonic River forced the faithful to stay home from the Suns game with Seacoast, Sunday’s Father’s Day matinee turned the tide, as Wahconah Park welcomed 966 fans who witnessed Pittsfield take down Martha’s Vineyard, 4-3.

Before the start, local fathers and their kids enjoyed the afternoon playing catch in left field before the game kicked off at 4:05.

Once the Suns players took the field, they may have forgotten their alarm clocks, as the Sharks circled the infield for a run in the third as Tad Gold singled home Max DiTondo off Suns starting pitcher Alex Basso.

“I think we were still sleepwalking at the beginning of the game, but we woke up,” said Suns Manager Tom Conley.

The Sharks added a run in the fifth, as DiTondo led off this time with a triple to the right-center gap and scored on a fielder’s choice before the Suns got on the board, as Morgan Phillips singled home Devon Reed, who reached on a one-out double.

With the Suns still trailing 2-1 heading to the bottom of the seventh, Great Barrington native John Kinne connected on his first hit of the season – a double just in between the diving Shark’s center fielder and the right fielder, Ryan Siegel, who was injured on the play.

Kinne’s double scored Frank Crinella, who had reached on a fielder’s choice, to tie the game up at 2-2 heading to the eighth frame.

The Sharks wouldn’t swim away however, as they battled to score the go-ahead run as Donnie Cimino reached on a one-out single and advanced to second following Chris Miller’s single off the glove of the pitcher Basso.

Basso walked the next hitter, DiTondo, to load the bases with one out, forcing Manager Conley to come out and take the ball.

Conley brought in side-arm reliever Adam Whitt, who proceeded to walk in a run on a full-count to give the Sharks the brief lead.

Whitt was fortunate to get out of the inning unscathed following the walk, as he worked a fielder’s choice at home and a fly out to center to end the inning trailing only 3-2.

The Suns came out in the bottom half and forced the Sharks to stir in their tank as leading hitter Ryan Dietrich reached on an error at third and advanced to third base on singles from both Kyle Singleton and pinch-hitter Brendan Slattery.

That left the bases loaded and the heroics up to returning Suns player and Harvard University catcher Steve Dill. Dill, who had only five RBIs last summer for the Suns, delivered the two-run single down the right-field line to put the Suns up for good, 4-3.

“[Dill] is a great kid – he really works hard and so I am glad he got a hit there, he has looked good at the plate but hasn’t gotten the results he wanted – but that was a huge hit,” Conley said.

Dill delivered the game-winning RBIs on a 0-0 count, taking the chest-high fastball to the opposite field.

“I was just looking for something up in the zone and he threw a fastball up – if you put some wood on it and drive it deep – some good things will happen,” Dill said.

The fireworks didn’t end there as the Suns’ Whitt allowed a leadoff single in the ninth to make things interesting.

Whitt was able to get the next hitter to fan for the first out but needed a stellar play at shortstop by Reed to get an acrobatic force-out at second to keep the Sharks at bay.

“[Kinne] looked smooth over there at [second base] and [Reed] made some big plays, especially in the ninth – that saved us,” Conley said.

Whitt was able to get a groundout to Kinne to end it and send all the fathers in the crowd home happy with a 4-3 win. The next home game for the Suns will be Saturday (June 22) at 7 p.m. against Torrington.

Posted by Tim Davis on June 20, 2013. Filed under College Sports,Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry