Flyers Baseball Sweeps St. Anthony’s 9-7 to Advance to Finals

To lose to the same team twice in a season may be simply chalked up to bad luck. To lose three times they call that a sweep.

But when you lose five straight – to an archrival no less – as  varsity baseball team did 9-7 Tuesday night to , ending their season and catapulting the Flyers into the NSCHSAA finals, Friars head coach John Phelan might have another word for that: Frustration.

Frustration that his bats, which scored only 3 runs in the , fell 2 runs short after managing to put a five spot on the scoreboard at SUNY Farmingdale, shutdown by a Flyers bullpen whose pitches at times had better luck finding the dirt then they did a strikezone but managed to limit St. Anthony’s to five hits and no additional runs.

And frustrated that his pitching has allowed 22 more runs to their archrival and been outscored 40-18 across the entire season.

“For a program that was expected to come in sixth or seventh… to come in third, to sweep St. Dom’s the first-place team, we’re a program that’s developing,” Phelan said. “We’re further along than we expected at the beginning of the season”

Frustration alone would have been enough to derail any team’s year, but when combined with the fatigue that comes at the end of a baseball season it makes for a potent mix.

Especially when you consider the Rivalry, which erupted on the field when St. Anthony’s Ryan D’Alessandro got into a shoving match with Chaminade secondbaseman Thomas Roulis after getting caught halfway to third in a 2-6-4 rundown which capped off the 5-run outburst from the Friars.

“Its just been the whole series,” Phelan said. “A lot of pushing and shoving, a lot of trash-talking.”

That shoving got the Friars catcher removed, but not before the benches had emptied onto the field.

Weissheir had frustrated the Friars for three straight innings, bringing a perfect game into the fourth only to lose it by plunking secondbaseman Matt Zsevic in the foot and DH Alex Castellano in the back.

A triple from firstbaseman David Groenveld into center over the head of Flyer centerfielder Michael Ferranti who misjudged the fly ended the no hitter.

“You could see that he was fatigued at that point, because it was a long inning that he sat here and he must have gotten a little tight,” Chaminade head coach Mike Pienkos said of his starter.

With the other semifinal match between St. Dominic’s and St. John the Baptist headed to a third game, the Flyers will get a much needed extra day of rest before the opening game of the finals Sunday at NY Tech.

“We need the rest that’s for sure,” Pienkos said, adding he didn’t have a preference between facing St. John’s or the co-conference champion Bayhawks.

“I just know we’re in the finals and we’ll face whomever comes,” he said.