The Sports Watch for April 18 - 23

It's Sunday, and you know what that means. It's time for the Sports Watch, the fastest three minutes in Weston Sports coming your way right now:

Well, they got the hitting and they got the pitching. Tom Wells delivered the game-winning three-run homer in the bottom of the seventh inning and Robert Charpie went the distance on the mound, striking out 10 and allowing just one earned run, as the Weston High baseball team stunned visiting non-league foe Greater Lowell Technical High, 7-4, last week.

"It was a great high school baseball game with both pitchers pitching well," Weston head coach Jon Beverly said. "They are two of the better pitchers in Division 3 right now."

Beverly was speaking of Charpie and his counterpart, Curtis Hamilton, who took Greater Lowell into sixth inning with a 2-0 lead.

But the Wildcats got their offense going with five consecutive hits in the sixth to take a 4-2 advantage. Nick Neu led off with a double, and Wells knocked him in with another two-bagger. David Miller singled in Wells to tie the game at 2. Then, Matt O'Connor ripped a two-run homer to give the 'Cats a two-run lead. Noah Tocci followed with a single, but was stranded.

Lowell tied it in the seventh. Back-to-back singles started the rally, and a Weston error allowed a run to score; the other runner moved to third. A successful squeeze play tied the game at 4, before Weston got out of the jam.

In the bottom of the seventh, Gage Hartman led off with a walk, and Neu reached on a wind-blown hit, making it first and second.

Wells delivered the goods with his three-run blast, finishing a 2-for-3 day with 4 RBIs and two runs scored.

Neu went 2-for-4 with a double, a triple, and two runs scored, while O'Connor went 2-for-3 with a homer, a double, and an RBI. 

Weston will visit Tyngsboro in a Dual County League Small Division matchup tomorrow.

Well, one thing about the Weston High boys’ lacrosse team, it certainly distributes the ball well.

"We continued to get balance scoring from [our] midfielders and attackmen as we have all season so far," Weston head coach Jim Wilcon said, after his squad improved to 6-0 with a decisive 13-5 win over visiting non-league foe Norwell on the Weston Turf. "We now have 11 different players that have scored this year, and most of those goals come off an assist from somebody, not just one on one scoring."

The win was a bit of payback for the 'Cats, who lost to Norwell in the Division 3 state tourney semifinals last spring.

The Wildcats scored four quick goals in the first quarter, with attacker Joey Pasquale and midfielders Rob Crockett, Adam Guerin, and Matt Knight all doing the honors.

Weston got four more goals in the second frame. Pasquale struck again twice for the hat trick, and attacker Jordon Fong and Geoff Ziobro also tallied. Fong later added two more strikes for a hat trick.

"We continued the pace and kept the pressure on,“ Wilcon said. "The pace of the game was where we wanted it to be, and we did a great job of attacking when the opening was there and slowing down and possessing the ball when it wasn't.”

The coach praised his top defensive line of Matt Atkins, Rob Bennett, and Owen Ward, and solid goalie Jared Fong for holding the visitors to just three goals in the first half. 

"The defense played great," said Wilcon, who also lauded fellow contributors Derek Shay, Greg Lanzillo, Matt Martin, Peter Scarpato, Jarrett Rowe, and Nick Coangelo for holding the fort in front of the Weston goal. 

"The defense stepped up many times to frustrate their offense," Wilcon said. "We played steady all the way through."

In softball, Weston almost did to Lincoln-Sudbury what Waltham did to the Wildcats. In the game against the Hawks, Waltham rallied with five runs to wipe out Weston's four-run lead in the last inning and win, 6-5. Last week, it was the visiting Wildcats who found the answer with five runs in the seventh to even the count with L-S, only to fall in the eighth inning by the same score to the Warriors in another heartbreaker.

Weston fell to 1-2 overall, and will begin its Dual County League Small Division slate Monday at home against Tyngsboro.

"We had a great comeback in the seventh and never gave up, " Weston head coach Kelly Harrington said. "Now we need to play hard for seven straight innings with our first three-game week coming up."

Sophomore star hurler Ariana Vasquez tossed all eight frames, allowing only six hits, while sriking out nine and walking four.

Offensively, Vasquez  had a double to account for one of six Weston hits. Seniors Sarah Ober and Jessilee Gross, junior Kristen Welby, sophomore Dani Silverstein, and freshman Talia Cramer also contributed with one hit apiece.

With Weston trailing, 5-0, in the top of the seventh, Dani Silverstein and Julia Bruce reached on errors. Cramer drove in the 'Cats first run with a single as Silverstein came across. Ober followed with another single, scoring Welby, who ran for Bruce. Sami Gosman reached on an attempted fielder's choice to load the bases, and Gross ripped a two-run single to tie the game.

But, in the bottom of the eighth, L-S rallied with a one out single and a hit batsman. After Vasquez induced an infield fly for the second out, the Warriors won it on an infield miscue.

Sophomore Becca Ryan pitched all eight innings for L-S. Like Vasquez, she scattered six hits, while striking out nine and walking four. At the plate, Ryan went 3- for-4 with three RBIs, while Mandy Sifferien had a two-run double in the first inning. Erin Deneen and Ann Marie Billig also had one hit apiece.  

Finally, battling unseasonably cold temperatures with a fierce wind to boot, a combined 23 Weston track and field standouts competed in the 16th Annual Rt. 228 Freshman-Sophomore Invitational Meet hosted by Notre Dame Academy in Hingham.

Sophomores Geoffrey Pendergast and Matt Herzig and freshmen Fini Bichara and Matt Keefe led the day for the Wildcats. Pendergast finished second in the 800 meter in a time of 2:06.29, while Herzig placed fourth in the two-mile, crossing at 10:11.82 .Pendergast also competed in the long jump, placing 24th with a leap of 16 feet, 3 inches.

Bichara, meanwhile, took fifth place in the triple jump with a leap of 32 feet, 8¼ inches, while Keefe finished sixth in the pole vault jump with a leap of 7 feet, 6 inches. Bichara just missed scoring in the high jump, where she tied for fifth on height but fell to ninth place on total jump tiebreakers.

The rest of the Wildcat contingent included, for the boys, sophomores Alexis Mundo (8th Javelin 114-10, 61st Discus); Nick Brackett (8th Pole Vault 7-00.00); Daniel Lang (18th Javelin 104-06); Rajah Nagarajah (28th Discus 77-01, 52nd Javelin 28-03); Adam Dvorak (36th Mile 5:18.19); Wyatt Maurer (37th 800M 2:26.60), Clarence Ng (40th Javelin 78-03), Eli Curme, (55th Mile); and freshmen Daniel Rigobon (9th Pole Vault 7-00, 61st 800M 2:44.31), Josh Breneville (30th 100M 12.85), Deondre Molyneaux (39th 400M 1:02.64), Andrew Connolly (42nd 800M 2:29.56), and John Condakes (71^st Shot Put 19-11.75).

And the rest of the Weston girls group included sophomores Edom Wessenyeleh (11th 800M 2:36.44); Catherine Cebulla (16th Long Jump 13-06.00); Jasmine Austrie (17thTriple Jump 28-04.00, 52nd Discus 43-07); Kayla Lawrence (20th 200M 29.79); and Jillian Belgrad (92nd 200M 32.50); and freshman Anna Neufeld (43rd Discus 49-07, 49th Shot Put 20-07.25, 54th 400M 1:17.48).