Big inning lifts Bedford baseball past Souhegan

AMHERST – The Bedford High School baseball team scored 10 runs in the top of the sixth inning to defeat Souhegan 16-5 in six innings Monday.

Ryan Mossman went six innings for the Bulldogs (1-0 in Division II), striking out eight while allowing five runs on seven hits and three hit batters. Mossman also had two hits and scored two runs, while Ben Philibrick drove in three runs and Ryan Gancarz had three hits and scored four runs.

Souhegan’s Terry Dugdale suffered the loss, giving up six runs on eight hits and two walks to go with six strikeouts. Dugdale also had a double and a triple to go with a run scored and a RBI. Chris Chininis also scored two runs and Robby McCormick had two hits.

“I think it’s good to get a win like this, especially against a pitcher like Terry Dugdale,” Bedford coach Billy Chapman said. “He’s one of the better pitchers in our division and for us to come out here and face him and put the ball in play and execute, really showed a lot.”

Dugdale felt good going into the start, the season opener for both teams, but didn’t do enough to keep the Bulldogs off balance.

“I felt we prepared well,” he said. “I was trying to keep everything low, and it ended up killing me because they were just going down and getting it. I need to mix it up a little more than I did.”

The teams went back and forth through five innings, with Souhegan taking a 2-1 lead in the first before Bedford tied it with a run in the second and went ahead by one in the third. The Sabers tied the game at 3 in the fourth, but the Bulldogs scored three times in the fifth to go up by three.

Bedford led 6-4 going into the sixth, but the first four runners reach base safely against Souhegan’s Tyler Hansis. McCormick came on in relief, but the Sabers had trouble behind him and the Bulldogs took advantage. Bedford sent 15 batters to the plate, scoring 10 runs on five hits, four errors, three walks and one hit batter.

“As coaches, you try to tell your players to stay away from the big innings,” Chapman said. “The term I use is damage control. I thought they had chances where they could have broken it open, but we made a big pitch or made a big play, whatever we needed to do to stop the damage from occurring.”

Souhegan got a run back in the bottom of the sixth, but left the bases loaded to end the game.

Bedford will host Oyster River on Wednesday at 4 p.m., while Souhegan faces Kingswood in Amherst at 4 on Wednesday.