Heights Baseball, Softball Hoping to Get Hot This Week

The Hasbrouck Heights baseball and softball teams know that they need to get hot this week if they want to go on a run in the state playoffs.

Both the Aviators baseball and softball teams will start on the road in the state tournament.

In addition the Hasbrouck Heights track and field teams dominated the competition in winning another Bergen County group titles for the boys and girls on Saturday.

The Aviators will have a tougher hill to climb this weekend when they travel to Randolph High School.

For the baseball team they hope that they are getting hot at the right time. The Aviators won their last couple of games of the regular season including a 10-9 victory over rival Wood-Ridge in Rockland County.

The softball team is coming off a tough loss, also to their rivals, Wood-Ridge, 5-3, in a special game at Montclair State on Friday night.

But Mother Nature has already stalled the state playoffs this week.

The Aviators baseball game along with many of the North Jersey high school playoff games were rained out on Monday.

Heights, the 10th seed, will try to play again on Tuesday as they travel to seventh-seeded New Milford in the first round of Group 1 North 1 state sectional.

And the Aviators softball team will try to play between the rain drops on Tuesday as the 12th seed and travel to fifth-seeded Park Ridge.

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Baseball

Hasbrouck Heights head coach Rocco Minichiello will be looking for the one hitter to break out this week.

Last season a couple of players like current senior Michael Pasqualone and graduated senior Danny Wynne had a big playoff season as the Aviators made it to the Group 1 North 1 state

"We need to get that hot hitter," said Minichiello.

The Aviators top hitters recently have been Gabe Toledo, Robert Klenk, Chris Abramo and Ray Espinosa. "We have a lot of the .300 hitters, but we don't have that .400 hitter," said Minichiello.

The Heights head baseball coach said that his team might be breaking out of their offensive slump. "We had 13 hits on Friday and we hadn't been doing that lately," said Minichiello.

The Aviators ended the regular season on a high note with a 10-9 victory over rival Wood-Ridge in Rockland County at the home of the Rockland Boulders, a minor league stadium.

It was a clean sweep for Heights against Wood-Ridge this season as the Aviators finished the regular season at 13-10.

And on Friday the Aviators held on to the North Jersey Interscholastic Conference Meadowlands B victory.

Against the Blue Devils, Minichiello received that offensive support from the likes of Abramo, Pasqualone and Matteis, all who had two RBI each.

Softball

Heights was looking to make it a clean sweep of neighborhood rival, Wood-Ridge, on Friday night in a special game at Montclair State University under the lights.

Earlier in the season the Lady Aviators had defeated Wood-Ridge, 6-5, in 11 innings in April at home.

And Heights was looking to sweep the Lady Blue Devils, but a comeback attempt fell short.

Wood-Ridge went ahead 5-0 after five innings before Heights started its comeback.

In the rally Aviators Carolyn Clites smacked a double and a pair of RBI while Diana Torres added a RBI.

But the comeback fell short in the top of the seventh inning.

Heights finished with a 12-11 record for the regular season.

The Aviators and the Blue Devils could face each other in the second round of the Group 1 North 1 state sectional on Thursday. Both teams would have to pull off upsets on Tuesday.

Outdoor Track and Field

The Hasbrouck Heights boys and girls track and field teams continued to dominate their competition.

The Aviators might have had tougher competition in last weekend's Bergen County Group Championships, but still took first place.

The Hasbrouck Heights boys team had the most points with 154, far outrunning Emerson and Midland Park with 60.33 and 50 points respectively. The Aviators collected 211 points last season in the same meet.

The Hasbrouck Heights girls team collected 138 points, far more than Park Ridge's 69 and Waldwick's 66 points. The girls total this season was slightly below the 2011 amount of 142 points.

The Aviator teams will try to come home with state sectional championships this weekend. In 2011 the Heights boys team won the Group 1 North 1 state team title while the girls finished third in the state sectional meet.

Last weekend, Aviators Rayn Moses made it a triple with three first place finishes, 100 and 200 meter runs along with the triple jump. Rebecca Fortoul added gold in the 800 and 3,200 meter races.

On the boys side Heights grabbed six first place finishes led by Roland Gamez who swept the jumps taking first in the long jump, high jump and the triple jump.

In addition Anthony Seidel added a pair of first place finishes in the javelin and the discus.

Bergen County Group D

(Hasbrouck Heights finishes in the Top three)

Girls

Discus

3. Irene Cedano, 102-feet-6

Long Jump

2. Rayn Moses, 16-feet-5.25

1600 Meter Run

2. Rebecca Fortoul, 5:28.38

100 Meter Dash

1. Rayn Moses, 12.91

800 Meter Run

1. Rebecca Fortoul, 2:26.05

200 Meter Dash

1. Rayn Moses, 26.96

3200 Meter Run

1. Rebecca Fortoul, 12:40.34

1600 Meter Relay

2. Hasbrouck Heights, 4:16.17

Shot Put

1. Irene Cedano, 36-feet-4

Javelin

2. Nina Messery, 120-feet-1

Triple Jump

1. Rayn Moses, 35-feet-1.25

Boys

Javelin

1. Anthony Seidel, 190-feet-3

3. Chris Connors, 159-feet-9

Shot Put

1. Chris Connors, 53-feet-4.25

3. Anthony Seidel, 49-feet-1.50

Long Jump

1. Roland Gamez, 21-feet-.50

2. Sven Nielsen, 20-feet-8.5

High Jump

1. Roland Gamez, 6-feet-4.25

400 Meter Hurdles

2. Sven Nielsen, 57.78

400 Meter Dash

2. Alex Sisco, 51.75

110 Meter Hurdles

2. Roland Gamez, 15.81

3. Sven Nielsen, 16.05

800 Meter Run

3. Alex Sisco, 2:05.65

1600 Meter Relay

3. Hasbrouck Heights, 3:40.90

Pole Vault

2. Alex Sisco, 13-feet

Discus

1. Anthony Seidel, 150-feet-9

Triple Jump

1. Roland Gamez, 43-feet-6

2. Sven Nielsen, 42-feet-10.50