Wilton Baseball Drops Regular-Season Finale to St. Joseph, 2-1

The regular season for the Wilton High School baseball team ended in odd fashion Friday afternoon.

Joe DellaVecchia scored the winning run from third base in the bottom of the seventh inning after right fielder Corey Fechter  caught Tyler Matakevich's fly ball in foul territory, as St. Joseph defeated the Warriors, 2-1, in Trumbull.

Wilton (16-4, 14-4) slipped to the No. 4 seed and will host No. 5 Fairfield Ludlowe in a quarterfinal game Monday. The top three seeds went to Staples, Greenwich and Norwalk.

Dropping to No. 4 isn't good for the Warriors because it means they likely would run into Staples in the semifinals,  assuming they get past Ludlowe.

Friday's regular-season finale was a crisply played affair completed in less than two hours.

Wilton starter Austin Gambee did not have his best stuff but turned in a gritty performance, overcoming control problems to hold the Cadets to one run through the first six innings. He hit walked four - one intentional - and  hit four batters, but surrendered only five hits.

"He didn't have his greatest control," Wilton coach Tim Eagen said. "He struggled with just about every pitch today, but he battled and that kept us in the game."

Unfortunately for Wilton, two of the hits Gambee allowed came in the seventh, as DellaVecchia and Jerry Kramer started the inning with singles.

They moved up on a wild pitch, putting runners on second and third with no outs and forcing the Warriors to walk Joey  Markanian so they would have a force at any base.

On an 0-2 pitch, Matakevich lofted a fly ball to fairly deep right field. Fechter should have let the ball drop. Instead, he instinctively made the play and DellaVecchia easily beat his throw home.

"You got to let in go, you got to know the situation," Eagen said. "I pulled everybody in, saying get to a spot where you can throw the guy out at the plate, and the guy hits a long flyball."

St. Joseph starter Brendan Nugent scattered six hits, also going the distance to earn the win.

Wilton had a chance to break on top in the first inning, loading the bases with one out on singles by Aaron Shapiro and Matt Baird and an infield hit by Scott Young.

However, Kurt Marut grounded back to the mound and Nugent started a home-to-first double play to get out of trouble. It set the tone for a frustrating afternoon for the Warriors.

"It's a tough loss because I think it's going to hurt us in the state tournament, not so much the FCIAC tournament," Eagen said. "As far as the states go, this may hurt us a little bit about getting a bye in the first round, which I really wanted."

St. Joseph loaded the bases in the third with no outs, but the Cadets settled for only one run, as Gambee induced Joe Burns to ground into a double play.

After Nugent got another double play to end the third, the Warriors pulled even in the fourth, manunfacturing a run.

Gambee led off with a walk and moved up on a balk and wild pitch. With two outs, Shapiro, who earlier in the week became only the fourth player in Wilton history to record 100 career hits, slapped an RBI single to center field.

The Warriors got a break when Marut reached on a wild pitch after striking out to open the seventh, but he was left stranded at second.

Despite the loss, Wilton completed a solid season the Warriors hope is far from over.

"It's a great season,  but we're looking to play for an FCIAC championship  and go for in the state tournament this," Eagen added.  "But to do that, you got to do the litte things well and I'm still concerned that sometimes we don't do the little things well."

Fairfield Warde's suprising 12-11 win over Norwalk on Friday created a three-way tie for second in the FCIAC with Norwalk, Greenwich and Wilton, but the Warriors lost tiebreakers to both.