The spectacular postseason run the Eastchester baseball team has embarked on over the last two weeks came to an end on Sunday afternoon, as the Eagles fell just short in their bid to capture a Section I title. Needing two wins in one day to lay claim to the program’s first championship since 2005, Eastchester made good in the finals opener before dropping a decisive 4-2 heartbreaker to Somers in a decisive Game 2.
Joe Sabia celebrates after recording an inning-ending out against Somers. Sabia took the hill in Sunday’s game on short rest and pitched admirably for the Eagles. Photos/Mike Smith
A loss in the double-elimination semifinal round forced the No. 3-seeded Eagles to play two more grueling games last week to reach the Class A finals, where they would have to beat No. 12 Somers twice in order to win the title.
The Eagles pulled off a pair of incredible extra-inning victories in their path to the championship round—including a walk-off grand slam to get past Nanuet and an eight-inning barnburner to topple league foe Rye on Wednesday—and even managed a come-from-behind victory against the Tuskers in Game 1 on Saturday afternoon.
The Eagles nearly conjured up some more magic in the bottom of the seventh inning of Game 2 when Nathaniel Lam smacked what would have been a game-tying double down the left field line, only to see the ball curve just foul.
Tuskers’ starter Stefan Swee would recover from the scare to record Lam for the final out of the game.
Eastchester head coach Jesse Waters admitted that his team might have been impacted by the extra games it had to play, but said he never doubted that his team had enough fight to bring home the sectional crown.
“I think it was about that will, that fight, that never-give-up attitude,” said Waters. “This has been our run towards the end, walking it off and not allowing one mistake to affect a game. We kept fighting, and that’s what we did until the last guy.”
Waters had high praise for his two Sunday starters, Chris Howard and Joe Sabia, both of whom logged high pitch counts in elimination games this week, but acquitted themselves well on Section I’s biggest stage.
Howard got the complete game win in Game 1, and Sabia—pitching on just three days rest—went the distance in Game 2, something Waters has come to expect from the gutsy right-hander.
“We got the pitching today from my two guys, 14 innings and that’s exactly what I expected,” said Waters. “[Sabia] is the one guy since last year that has gone on short rest, so we had faith and confidence that he could do the job. Even though he threw a lot of pitches in the last week, he gave us everything we could have asked for.”
Offensively, the Eagles got big days from Lucas McLaughlin and Lam, but Waters felt that the team’s inability to make the most of scoring opportunities in the first few innings would eventually prove to be the Eagles’ downfall.
“We had guys in scoring position early on and couldn’t get them in, and that came back to bite us,” said Waters. “We just didn’t get those hits early when we needed to.”
Regardless of the final outcome against Somers, however, Waters is confident that the team’s playoff push—and its effect on Eastchester’s returning players—will be something that will set the tone for future season.
“We have young guys, sophomore pitchers, who got to see this and be a part of it, and they got to see what was done by our two starters this year and it can’t not rub off on them,” said Waters. “And we have other younger guys on the squad, so all that fight, I think we’re going to see it come through again next year.”
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