By ABIGAIL SCHMIDT
HOUGHTON, N.Y—There’s a reason Dan Crozier (Cazenovia) leads the New York Collegiate Baseball League in RBI: when you need one, he delivers.
Crozier did just that Sunday afternoon at the Kerr-Pegula Athletic Complex against the Geneva Twins as he delivered a walk-off single, and the Genesee Rapids turned a five-run deficit into a 7-6 victory.
“I was just thinking about the pitches he [Kyle Monk, Emory] threw me last at-bat and just keeping my head in there and driving the first thing I saw come over the plate,” Crozier said.
“As soon as I struck out the at-bat before,” he continued, “my teammates told me to keep my head up and that they had me. They were really positive; it’s a great team we have here. They were behind me 100 percent. They told me to just go out there and do what I do, and we ended up coming home with a win.”
With the score still tied in the bottom of the ninth, Austin Hauck (Sienna Heights) and Jake Shelby (Hesston) singled. With one out, Crozier hit a perfectly placed ball into centerfield to bring Karlis Graubics (Marymount), pinch runner for Hauck, home for the victory.
“It’s huge that we were able to be mentally tough enough, and from the fifth inning on just not giving up and taking every at-bat seriously; not giving anything away,” Genesee manager Tyler Rost said. “It shows a lot of character.”
The Twins came out strong with three runs in the first inning after Taylor Vile (Castleton St) hit a bases-clearing triple with two outs. They struck again with a solo shot from Joshua Handzik (St. Josephs) in the third. A Jeremy Tejada (Southern New Hampshire) RBI double and a JT Pittman (Le Moyne) sacrifice fly made the score 6-1 going into the bottom of the sixth.
JT Conti (Wayne St) was on the mound for the Twins for five full innings and got the first out of the sixth inning. The sophomore from Michigan allowed only two runs on five hits and struck out two.
“Their pitcher was pretty tough the first time through the lineup,” Rost comments. “We’ve seen very few lefties this year, so I think it took a few innings to adjust to that.”
The bottom of the sixth inning was when the Rapids found a spark. They scored three runs, two of which coming from a Nick Ippolito (Cal St Stanislaus) triple with two outs against.
“We had a couple defensive miscues that hurt us a little bit,” said Twins’ manager Andy Weeks. “I told my guys we just need to be smarter in certain situations. I think we were a little overaggressive defensively. We had pretty good contact all day long, we just have to put a full game together.”
After one run in the seventh, the tying run came for the Rapids came again with two outs working against them. First baseman Corey Andrade (Anna Maria) smacked a triple to bring Ryan Dickt (Virginia-Wise) home to knot the score at six.
“Guys just grinded at-bats out,” Rost continued. “We were able to put a few good innings together late in the game.”
Breton LaRose (Sacred Heart) got the win for the Rapids. He allowed no runs, no hits and struck out one in the ninth inning.
Brett St. Clair (Walsh) and Jason Collingwood (Greenville) also pitched for the Rapids on the day.
At the plate, Ippolito and Andrade tallied a triple and two RBI each. Hauck recorded three doubles while Bailey Smith (Howard Payne) had two.
The mound saw four different Twins in the course of the game. Monk took the loss while Max Tessitore (Le Moyne) and Andy LaLonde also saw action.
Vile had three RBI on the day for Geneva.
The Twins fall to 5-5 with the loss, and will host the Hornell Dodgers, Monday. A 7 pm first pitch is scheduled.
The Rapids improve to 9-4 on the season and sit at the top of the NYCBL’s Western Division. They start a three-game set with Hornell, Wednesday night in Houghton.
Written by Abigail Schmidt, junior year business and communications major at Houghton College
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