By Stephen Borgna
CORTLAND, N.Y.— Patrick Merryweather (Onondaga CC) took a shutout into the ninth as the Syracuse Jr. Chiefs knocked off the Cortland Crush for a lopsided 7-2 victory in New York Collegiate Baseball League action at Beaudry Park, Thursday evening.
It was the pitcher’s first complete game of the season, and helped the Jr. Chiefs snap a two-game skid.
“My curveball was working, and also my cutter was actually working for the first time this year, so that was also helping me out” Merryweather said. “I was able to mix it up a lot.”
The 6-3 left-hander had nine strikeouts on the day.
“It helped out that I didn’t get any walks,” Merryweather said when explaining how he kept his composure for a full nine innings. “I was trying to keep the pitch count low.”
“He was excellent tonight,” Syracuse head coach Chris Haynes said. “(Merryweather) was just going after batters and being aggressive. He was setting the tone and throwing his pitches, and not getting behind.”
“We faced a very good pitcher,” Cortland general manager Bill McConnell said. “Merryweather pitched very well.”
Behind Merryweather, Syracuse’s defense stood poised and maintained composure. Cortland was allowed only seven hits throughout the contest—two of which came in a ninth-inning rally.
“We did really well today,” Merryweather said, referring to the Chiefs’ defense. “It was a big help.”
Syracuse’s offense began churning in the first. Cooper Belyea (Ithaca) found the left field gap for a two-RBI single.
“Cooper had a huge hit for us early on, and I thought that really set the tone for the rest of the game,” Haynes said. “First inning, it was important to jump on them and we did.”
Syracuse hit consistently throughout after their jump start in the first. They scored again in the sixth on a Riley Moonan (Fairleigh Dickinson) RBI triple to center field. Belyea plated another with an RBI double in the seventh. Belyea collected three RBI on the night.
“We swung the bats great,” Haynes said.
Syracuse put up two more runs in the eighth after Belyea walked and Mark Martin (Bryant) was hit by a pitch, both with bases loaded.
The Chiefs’ combined performances at the plate, in the field, and on the mound led to a decisive-win. Haynes called the victory his team’s best game of the season thus far.
“It’s probably one of our, probably is our most-complete game of the season so far,” Haynes said. “We’ve been talking about playing hard one-through-nine. I thought we did that tonight and, you know, it showed by the scoreboard.”
Despite coming up short against Merryweather throughout, the Crush managed a short-lived rally in the ninth.
Zacchary Racusin (Essex) started it off with a double to right. Greg Jasek (Clarkson) followed up with an RBI triple.
Nick Rybarczyk (Southern Illinois) would groundout after, but not without sending Jasek home for an RBI.
The Crush were unable to complete the rally.
“We got the bats going at the end,” McConnell said. “We got a couple runs across the board, and at least didn’t get blanked.”
“We just got to rebound right now, put together a good, solid game.”
Cortland ended the game with seven hits to Syracuse’s 11. At seven games out, the Crush are gearing for a late-season push into the playoffs.
“We got to dig ourselves out of a hole now, we’re (seven games) out of it with 14, 15 games to go,” McConnell said. “So everybody in our division, our conference we got to beat.”
Zachary Lander (Brockport) hurled two strikeouts for Cortland
Jasek led Cortland with two hits—a pair of singles in the fourth and the ninth.
McCann had two singles for Syracuse in the first and the eighth, with two stolen bases.
Gabe Levanti (Northeastern) led Syracuse with three hits—a bunt for a single in the first, followed by two more singles in the second and eighth.
Belyea had a two-RBI single in the first, and an RBI double in the seventh, finishing with three RBI.
Merryweather improved to 4-1.
Benjamin Parkes (Ithaca) took the loss. The southpaw allowed three runs on five hits and six walks over five innings.
Derrick Murphy (Virginia Intermont) pitched two shutout innings in relief for Cortland.
The Chiefs (11-22) travel to Geneva, Friday for a matchup with the division leading Red Wings (19-11). A 7 p.m. first pitch is scheduled at McDonough Park.
Cortland (11-21) hosts the Rochester Ridgemen (17-15) for the first time in organization history. The game is also set for a 7 p.m. start.
Leave a Reply