St. Thomas Comeback Falls Short; Nova, Western, South Plantation Advance

St. Thomas was attempting to make it a clean sweep for Broward teams in the Nova Spring Break Tournament on Saturday, but the Raiders fell just short in their comeback attempt against Bartow. Nova, Western, and South Plantation joined Bartow in the winner’s bracket of the annual tournament.

St. Thomas came into the Saturday evening game feeling good about their chances to win the tournament. The Raiders have been one of the county’s most consistent teams over the past several weeks, having not lost since their opening game. On Saturday, they ran into a Bartow team that had just enough left in the tank to hold off a furious Raiders rally and advance with a 4-3 win at Pat McQuaid Field.

St. Thomas starter Alec Byrd ran into trouble in the first, giving up four runs on five hits. Byrd did manage to strike out the last two batters of the inning to avoid further damage.

From there, the St. Thomas sophomore was spectacular. Byrd pitched a complete game, giving up no more hits after the first. The only Bartow base runner from innings two through six came on an error. Despite the tough first inning, the Raiders pitcher felt like he had good stuff on this night.

“They were a good hitting team, jumping on the fastball, and I just had to mix it up a little more, and it worked.” said Byrd, speaking of how he made an adjustment on the mound after the first inning.

St. Thomas made the game interesting in the seventh. After going scoreless through six, Edmund Mussa led off the seventh with a walk. Andrew Hernandez and Charlie Cormier also drew walks, loading the bases with nobody out. Ryan Reyes singled, cutting the lead to 4-1.

After Jake Rudock popped out to the catcher, Matt Franco singled in Hernandez. a ground out to first plated the third run of the inning, and put the tying and go-ahead runs in scoring position. Brandon Barnes, however, grounded out to short, ending the game.

“We’ve got a lot of season left, and a lot of good baseball to play,” said Raiders Head Coach Robert Lawson. “You never want to lose, but I think this would be classified as a good loss. We got behind, we battled, we had an opportunity to win the game. I’m disappointed, but I’m not overly concerned.”

In the earlier game of the day at Nova, the host Titans defeated Cooper City 7-0 behind a strong pitching performance by Ronny Patella. The Titans senior threw a complete game shutout, allowing only three hits while striking out five.

Offensively, Nova was led by George Gugino, who went 1-for-3 with two RBIs. Skylar Fox added two hits and an RBI, and Zakk Leonetti was 1-for-3 with a two runs scored and an RBI.

Western and south Plantation advanced in the Nova tournament as well. The Wildcats will now face Bartow at 1PM Monday at Western in the first semi-final game, and later in the evening, Nova will host South Plantation at 7PM in the other semi-final match up. The title game will be held Tuesday night at Nova.

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