With the Baldwinsville baseball team, it was not a case of sneaking onto the big stage at Alliance Bank Stadium to play for the Section III Class AA championship.
No, the no. 3 seed Bees had to get there with high style, as symbolized by Saturday’s 16-6 dismantling of no. 2 seed and defending champion Liverpool in the AA semifinals.
From top to bottom, B’ville’s order toyed with five different Warrior pitchers, earning 16 hits and scoring in every inning except the second.
And by doing so, the Bees earned the trip to the Syracuse Chiefs’ home diamond Wednesday night at 7 p.m. to face no. 4 seed Fayetteville-Manlius for the sectional title. The Hornets eliminated West Genesee (10-5) and top seed Watertown (8-3) to get this far.
B’ville, the state’s no. 3-ranked AA team, arrived in Liverpool with hot bats. In its last two games – the May 19 regular-season finale against Bishop Ludden and the AA quarterfinal win over Syracuse West – the Bees had racked up 42 total runs.
Against Liverpool starter Alex Caruso, who beat B’ville 4-3 back on May 3, the onslaught continued. Josh Savacool led off the game with an infield hit, Brett Charbonneau singled and Gabe Levanti hit a bad-hop RBI single. When Zach Leo doubled home Charbonneau and Levanti, the Bees had a quick 3-0 lead.
Scott Orr, who had also pitched in that earlier game against Liverpool, had one real crisis. After retiring the first eight batters he faced, Orr loaded the bases with two out in the bottom of the third, but got Caruso to hit a comebacker right to him for the third out.
From there, B’ville was never in danger. It doubled a 4-0 lead and chased Caruso with four runs in the fourth and added three runs in the fifth to make it 11-0. Though Liverpool did get six runs in the last three innings, it was far from enough.
Charbonneau reached base six times, earning three hits and two walks and scoring four runs. Leo went four-for-six with a double and team-best five RBIs, while Connor Martin used his pair of hits to drive in four runs. Josh Demoski added two RBIs and made a diving catch in center field, too. Levanti and Martin each scored three times.
B’ville and F-M played a thriller on May 10 that took nine innings before the Bees pulled it out, 4-3. In that game, Zach Tucker, soon to be Charbonneau’s teammate at Le Moyne, pitched eight innings. Tucker is likely to be on the mound again, opposing B’ville’s Scott Blewett.
