Baseball Comes Up Short in State Sectional Game

Westfield High's baseball team believed that perhaps karma was behind them.

Especially after such a heroic comeback that beat Hillsborough Saturday in an epic
12-inning, 7-6 win in a NJSIAA North 2 Group IV quarterfinal.   

But the Blue Devils were stopped 12-3 by Bridgewater-Raritan Tuesday in the sectional semifinals.   

The Blue Devils, who were hoping to become the first Westfield baseball team since
1988 to win a sectional title, finished the season with a 18-9 record.    

Six walks and four errors were part of the problem.    

"We walked too many people and we made way too many errors and that was the
difference in the ballgame,'' said longtime Westfield coach Bob Brewster. "Walks and errors that just gives them loads of people on base without even having to get a base hit and they got a couple of big hits that put the ball out of the park.''   

The Blue Devils had a couple of bad breaks.   

Westfield had a 1-0 lead when Andrew Lyman led off the third with a flyball to center field that was ruled a homer by infield umpire Joe Shaw. Center fielder Brett Johnson believed the ball was in play, as did Brewster. But Shaw ruled a homer and the game was tied.   

"The umpire said before the game, it's a tough fence when a guy is leaning against

the fence and the ball is there what do I call? We saw three times today, who knows if they were home runs or not,'' Brewster said. "I'm 300 some odd feet away.Those things happen. But the difference is their pitchers didn't walk anybody and we walked a load of people. It was the walks that killed us. And defensively we were terrible and we had played such great defense the last week and a half.''   

Westfield, the No. 3 seed in the 16-team tournament, took a 1-0 lead in the first
inning on an RBI groundout by junior first baseman Dan Kerr. But Bridgewater-Raritan took advantage of four walks and a couple of errors and scored seven runs in the third inning to take a 7-1 lead. Westfield never recovered.  

Westfield senior right hander Rob Anderson walked three straight batters after the
home run. He did strike out Jordan Weinstein. But catcher Brian Murphy drove in two runs with a single and second baseman Mike Giordano followed with an RBI single.    

Later, Lyman, making his second plate appearance of the inning, hit a groundball
that was booted allowing two more runs to score and the Panthers led 7-1.   

Junior catcher A.J. Murray went 2-for-3 with a walk and shortstop Tim Younger went 2-for-4 with an RBI single in the fourth. Westfield scored two runs that inning to cut the lead to 7-3. But Bridgewater-Raritan scored two in the fifth and three more in the sixth to put it away.