Baseball Team Ready For State Sectional Final

All was generally quiet at Memorial Field yesterday afternoon. With the Cranford varsity baseball team working on their final preparations for today's state sectional championship game against Morristown this afternoon, the loudest noise was the constant clink of the ball hitting aluminum bat during batting practice.

The well-oiled machine was going about their business, with groups of players in the field grabbing grounders and shagging fly balls. Others rotated to the batting cage to get extra swings before waiting for their turn to take BP on the field.

But come 4 p.m. this afternoon, the solitude of practice and the empty stands, will turn into a loud buzz of anticipation with a large crowd of Cougar faithful waiting to cheer on the Union County champs.

What will it take to win the game? Head coach Dennis McCaffery has the answer.

"Hopefully we score one more run than they do."

As usual, the Hall of Fame coach isn't about to give away any secrets, keeping everything close to the vest as he has in his twelve years at the helm.

Who's pitching? We'll all find out just before game time.

"We don't know if we're going to go with Kurt (Rutmayer), start Ryan (Williamson) or maybe go with Nick Cook. We're not sure what we're going to do. Nick Cook hasn't pitched yet and he brings a different look, a big hard-throwing lefty, and maybe Ryan will start or come in relief. We don't know what we're going to do yet. It's probably going to be one of those three starters, or maybe Vinny Colaneri will pitch a little bit."

In other words, if anyone from the Morristown roster is reading this, you better be ready for anything.

And the Cougars will have to be as well. The Colonials not only defeated South Plainfield, the top-ranked team in the state at the time, but it was Morristown who held the No. 1 spot earlier in the season.

"We're trying to get ready for a very good Morristown team," said McCaffery. "We know we're going to have our hands full. They hit, they have a balanced lineup, they have four pitchers that are very good. They make the plays. They are fundamentally sound. It's an outstanding program and well-coached. We know it's going to be a very difficult game for us."

It sounds like he could be describing his own program.

The Cougars have been the comeback kids of late, winning the UCT crown after trailing both Scotch Plains and Westfield on their way to victory. They were down 5-0 in the final and came back to win 6-5.

Tuesday, Cranford came back again to defeat SP-F, allowing them the right to play for today's title. It's all about staying focused and believing in their ability to fight back.

"Probably our best feature, is that we don't panic when we get behind," said first baseman Greg Matlosz. "We just try and calmly get our runs back. So when we get behind, we don't freak out, we just maintain our composure."

"We're feeling pretty good right now after coming off that win against Scotch Plains," said catcher Marc Linger, who had the game-winning RBI against the Raiders. "It was close, but we ended up winning the game. I got to two strikes on that at-bat, and he threw me a pretty slow curve ball before it, so I was looking for the curve ball and reacting to fastball, and was looking to shoot it the other way and that's exactly what I did."

Freshman Sean Feeley tagged up from third to make the score 6-3, and that insurance run was the key when SP-F came back with two runs in the final inning.

That sac fly and a few forced throwing errors, along with outstanding defense and pitching, are reasons why the Cougars live to play another day..

"We're a team that's not going to be hitting a lot of home runs and we're not going to beat teams from our hitting," said junior shortstop Sean Trotter, who has a .380 batting average for the season. "So we have to play a little small ball, and when other teams make mistakes, we have to score off them and make them pay for it. Whenever a team makes a mistake, we come right at them and we make 'em pay."

On the mound, sophomore righthander Kurt Rutmayer has been making opponents pay, as he and freshman Ryan Williamson continue to improve with every inning.

"Me and Ryan, since we have so much experience now, I think in the future we'll be even more experienced and can bring a lot more wins to the Cranford organization," said Rutmayer. "We're always just looking to go out there and throw strikes to win the game."

If they do that later today, there's a good chance the Cougars will add another championship to their overflowing resume.