Kennedy Baseball Takes First of Three-Game Series From Massapequa

After a dominating 16-6 victory over Herricks High School over the weekend, Kennedy came into Monday's game at Massapequa High School trying to carry their play from that playoff match into a three-game series against the Chiefs.

Minus the overwhelming amount of hitting that went on in Saturday's game, the Cougars continued their good play against Massapequa as they took the first game of the series, 4-1.

Kennedy starting pitcher Rob Stalzer came into the game having rested for more than a week, and it showed in his complete game performance. He struck out seven in his seven innings of work, while only surrendering five hits.

"Seven innings against Massapequa giving up one run is incredible, they're a great team," Kennedy head coach Eric Passman said. "They're defending Long Island champions."

Stalzer did give up six free passes in the game, three of those coming in the sixth inning and resulting in the only run of the day for the Chiefs when he walked in a run. It seemed like whenever Massapequa was threatening with runners on base Stalzer managed to get out of the jam. That's just what he did after walking in a run, when the Chiefs had the bases loaded and the tying run on first base. He was able to get Massapequa's Paul Tarantino to ground out to end the inning.

"Guys have got to step up in big situations and today their guy was the guy who stepped up," Massapequa head coach Tom Sheedy said.

On top of his seven Ks, Stalzer also induced nine groundball outs, two of which were double play balls. With no fence in the outfield at Massapequa High School, it really helps a team when a pitcher consistently gets hitters to get on top of the ball.

"In this particular field it's imperative," Passman said.  "Once that ball goes in the gaps, it's doubles and triples."

The Cougars managed to get the ball in those gaps on a few occasions Monday. The first of those came on the second pitch of the game, when Kennedy shortstop Noah Shulman clobbered a pitch into right-center field. With no fence to stop the ball it continued to roll, which allowed Shulman to travel all the way around the bases for a home run.

Two of the other runs Kennedy scored were walked batters who were eventually driven home. One scored on a triple by Andrew Wood, and the other came home thanks to an RBI single by Jordan Leopold.

"We're situational hitting a little bit with runners on base we seem to be hitting the ball a little bit," Passman said. "We missed a couple today out there, we left a couple of runners on base, but we got enough to get it done."

Game two of the series is today at 4:30 p.m. at Kennedy High.

Passman wouldn't comment on the prospects of making it to the semifinals with just one win knowing which team stood in the way of that.

"We're just going one game at a time with this team," Passman said of Massapequa. "They're not champions for nothing."