Westfield Blue tops Readington 14-7 in N.Edison Tournament

Thursday July 9

On a cool summer night, the Westfield Blue was back at North Edison for tournament play. The players came focused and ready, and their bats heated up quickly. At the top of the first inning, with two outs and Oberman at first base reached with a line drive to the middle, Hess came to the plate. With a vicious swing, Hess reached 2nd while scoring Oberman, which jumpstarted the Westfield offense. After a walk of O. Murray, a strong hit by G. Murray sent both Hess and O. Murray home. Lin followed with a double scoring G. Murray. After another 7 consecutive singles and a double by Barmakian, Westfield collected 11 runs in the inning. By end of the night, every player had at least one hit, while Roth, Oberman, Hess, Colwell, Cruiscuolo, Brancatella, Lanker each had two hits. The 3 for 3 showing by Jeffery earned him the first game ball of the night.

Roth took the mound at the bottom of the first inning, and his fastball proved too much to handle by Readington. Aided by strong Westfield defense, Roth finished the first two innings without giving up a single run.

In the third inning, Colwell started with a double to the middle. With timely hits by Cruiscuolo, Lanker and Jeffery, Westfield added three more scores. At the bottom of the 3rd inning, taking advantage of a couple of walks and well-timed hits, Readington finally got on the board. After three innings, Westfield led by a score of 14 to 3.

In the fourth inning, Barmakian made a strong pitching debut, and was then relieved by Oberman for two more innings. Readington was able to add two scores in the 4th, one in the 5th and one in the 6th inning. At the bottom of the 6th inning with the bases loaded, Lin came to the mound and struck out the last Readington batter thus ending the game with a final score of 14:7.

Westfield Blue had several excellent plays defensively. At shortstop, Barmakian fielded a couple of balls cleanly in the first inning resulting in two quick outs setting the tone for the game. Brancetella caught a fly ball in right field in the 2nd inning and provided the final out of the inning. In the 3rdinnng, Colwell, while playing shortstop, had a beautiful backhanded and over the shoulder grab leading to the first out of the inning. In the 5th inning, Lanker charged on a ground ball in leftfield, and immediately fired to Colwell at 3rd thus throwing out the lead runner and preventing further damage by Readington. Lanker’s effort and spectacular play earned him the second game ball of the night.


Game Recap by Linus Lin

Images from this game can be seen by clicking HERE