Baseball Beats Dayton 11-5 to Advance in County Tournament

For the second time this week, the left-handed power hitter Nick Cook delivered a crushing home run, this time a grand slam, which helped lead the Cranford varsity baseball team to a 11-5 victory over Dayton in the first round of the Union County Tournament.

"The guy made mistakes, he walked a couple of guys, gave opportunities to everyone else, and he just left it out over the plate, I got a good pitch to hit," senior Cook said of the home run pitch. "I saw the rightfielder just standing there. I didn't know if he was right under it and was going to catch it, or if it was over his head. I was happy we got off to a quick start."

Cook also delivered with his arm, as the southpaw improved his record to 3-0 with a solid three innings of two-hit ball, giving up one earned run while striking out three.

"I thought that we did a good job getting a number of runs early in the game," said head coach Dennis McCaffery. "Nick Cook did a good job, getting a good pitch to hit, he drove it out for a grand slam, it set a real nice tone for the game. Nick got his work in today, threw strikes. He did a real good job offensively as well as pitching-wise."

The team has been getting up long before school starts for some extra reps in the batting cage. The hard work is paying off.

"We've been going in the morning, hitting, so we feel a lot better hitting now," Cook said. "I'm confident. I'm getting the swing back."

The Cougars have been attacking often and early as their offense gets into gear at just the right time of the season. Dayton picked up a run, but Cranford answered back with eight runs in the bottom of the first and held the Bulldogs at bay from there.

"It's always nice to play with a lead," said McCaffery. "It sets a nice tone, and it's a credit to our kids. They've been hitting every morning for the last two weeks prior to school, 6:30 in the morning they're hitting, really trying to improve in that area of the game. It's a hard working group of kids. Hopefully we'll continue to improve."

Highlights included Rob Ghiretti's run-scoring triple in the sixth inning and a perfectly executed squeeze play by Justin Van Ostenbridge, who laid down a beautiful bunt to score Ghiretti in the same frame.

Ghiretti went 3-for-4 with a run scored and an RBI. Sean Trotter and Mark Osofsky each scored two runs and added a hit, as Cranford improved to 13-3 on the season.

"Right now I'm feeling real good at the plate," said Ghiretti, a senior who has four hits in his last five at-bats. "You have to feel you're getting a hit every time. This is the best we played all year. We want to take every game, one game at a time and not look past the game we're playing right now."

"I've been playing well," said shortstop Sean Trotter. "I'm a lot more confident at the plate. Hopefully, I'll keep playing well and we'll keep winning. If we keep playing like this, hopefully we'll go a little farther. We'll take it one game at a time, though."

While the coach is happy with the w's, he's always looking to keep his players focused for that full seven innings.

"I wish offensively, we were more consistent throughout the game," said McCaffery. "I thought a couple of times, we gave away some at-bats and scoring opportunities which I really think can come back to bite you if you don't take advantage of opportunities that present themselves. But we won."

Vinnie Colaneri and Ryan Williamson also spent time on the mound in the winning effort.

The Cougars will have another busy week ahead, when they face Johnson on Tuesday in regular-season action before hosting Roselle Catholic Wednesday in the second round of the Union County Tournament. Game time is slated for 4 p.m.