Exeter Post 32 baseball hangs on to beat Derry Post 9 in slugfest
Exeter holds of Derry to pick up ninth win in a row.
DERRY – The Exeter Post 32 baseball team has used a combination of pitching and offense to steamroll opponents in the last two weeks.
But Post 32 found out Wednesday that it can still win when the other team is hitting, too.
Exeter twice had a five-run lead, but needed some late offense and some good defense to hold on for a 12-9 win over Derry Post 9 in a District B American Legion game. The win was the ninth in a row for Exeter (12-2), which scored more than 10 runs in a game for the eighth time this year and sixth time in its last seven games.
Mike Sterritt led the way by going 5 for 6 with an RBI and a run scored, while Colin Shapiro was 2 for 4 with three runs scored and Cody Morissette and Jack Arend had drove in a pair of runs.
“We manufactured some runs and we were hitting in good situations, which I’m pleased with,” Exeter coach Tim Mitropoulos said. “It took a while to get going, and I don’t think we ever had a grasp of the game. Sometimes you’ve got to grind wins out.”
Post 32 finished the game with 15 hits and walked 11 times, and needed every single one, as Derry (6-9) had 16 hits and kept things interesting despite its struggled on the mound.
“We are kind of thin at pitching and that’s evidenced by how many runs we’ve given up on certain days,” Derry coach Dylan Mullin said. “The kids have hit the ball pretty well the last two or three weeks. Sometimes we’ve been able to outhit teams and (Wednesday) wasn’t one of those days.”
Mike Bournival led the Post 9 offense by going 4 for 6 with a triple and three RBIs, while Rich Marique, Brian Sutton, Matt Clark and Ryan Simard each had two hits and drove in a run.
Exeter got on the board with two runs in the first and three more in the second off Derry starter David Currier to go ahead 5-0, but Post 9 responded with three runs of its own in the bottom of the second to make it 5-3.
Post 32 added a single run in the third and the fourth to take a 7-3 lead, but Post 9 came back with two runs in the bottom of the fourth to make it a two-run game again.
In the top of the sixth, Exeter loaded the bases with one out, and scored two more runs on a walk to Kyle Ball and a groundout by Shapiro to make it 9-5.
Exeter put two on with one out in the seventh and Kyle Maurice came through with an RBI single to make it 10-5, but Derry turned a double play to get out of the inning. In the eighth, Post 32 got two runs with two outs, but a base running mistakes ended what could have been a bigger inning.
“One hit away, it would have broken it open, but we just never got that,” Mitropoulos said. “We hit a few right at guys and they made some good plays, and they hit a few where we weren’t.”
Derry got the two runs back in the bottom of the eighth on RBI singles by Bournival and Simard. Exeter went down in order in the ninth – the only inning no one reached base – Post 9 got an RBI single from Marique and Bournival followed with a run-scoring triple to make it 12-9.
Sutton followed with a hard groundball to the right of second base, but Exeter’s Jared Brescia was able to track it down and get Sutton by a step for the final out.
“We talked about before the game that we had to win out in the last two games to even have a chance at (the tournament),” Mullin said. “We had to take that mentality to the last out. The kids did that, we scored two runs in the ninth inning, and we just couldn’t get any more.”
Derry would need a lot to happen in the final four days of the regular season to make the state tournament, while Exeter has already clinched a spot and holds the No. 1 seed in the district.
