Clarkstown Rivals Clash: North Baseball Defeats South, 7-4

In the clash between the hometown rivals, Clarkstown North High School baseball  emerged victorious Monday over Clarkstown South High School to continue an undefeated 4-0 start to the season.

“It was great, South is our biggest rival,” said the Rams head coach Mike Pisano.  “Margiotta pitched a great game.  We made most of the plays.  I think we had one, maybe two errors.  Again, great pitching and defense.  But today, they had a couple decent pitchers on the mound today and our guys swung the bats.  We had two or three two-out hits and there’s nothing like a two out single to drive in runners.  That was huge.  It was a total team effort.  Ian Schulman again, behind the plate, pop-ups, he just made the plays.  It was a total team effort and I’m impressed with the guys today.  After the last two games that were not so close, you wonder how much intensity they have, but they had it today.  It’s always good to beat South and I was proud of the guys.”

South is still looking for a win this season, after going 0-3 to start.  Despite the tough start to the season, the Vikings head coach Vinny Michello was optimistic about their prospects this season as he laid out what they need to do to get the win.

“We’ve got to get back to the basics, fielding the ground balls and putting the ball in play on the ground or on line drives,” said Michello.  “I’m still very confident with this team.  Basically, there’s a lot of room for improvement and I think these guys will make the adjustments.  I think we’re going to be a competitive team every game.”

South’s starting pitcher, senior Matt Marks, started off strong, but ended up giving up the lead in the third and being replaced in the fifth by senior Matt Lawson.  After giving up two, Lawson was replaced by senior Evan Paliotta.  He let up one more in the fifth before getting out of the inning.  Paliotta was replaced by senior Kieran Koch, who let up two in the sixth before closing out the inning.

For North, the winning pitcher, junior T.J. Margiotta, finished the night with four strikeouts and four walks, while letting up nine hits and only two earned runs.  Senior Kyle Quigly replaced Margiotta in the seventh, which he closed out strong after letting up two runs.

“I think my curve ball was on, my fastball was definitely feeling good, but definitely some things that I’ve got to work on,” said Margiotta.

South came out hot in the first as junior Eric Cayne picked up an RBI to put the Vikings up 1-0.  Though the Rams came out a little flat, their bats came alive in the third.  Senior Anthony Barbetto hit a monster triple to tie it up and senior Brandon Pochter then brought Barbetto home to give North a 2-1 lead.

“It was great, coming in off the bench, pinch hit for that,” said Barbetto.  “Coach knew what he had to do, put me in at the right time, came up with a big hit and went ahead.  It was great.” He added, “We were slumping in the beginning, but once we came into the dugout, coach gave us a great speech and we turned it right up after that.”

Both sides got out of a bit of trouble to keep it at 2-1 going into the bottom of the fifth.  North came alive again to take a commanding 5-1 lead off RBIs by Margiotta, senior Greg Baron and senior Ian Schulner.  South got it going again in the bottom of the sixth when senior Conor Bacalles popped one up to senior shortstop Tom Colaprico, who missed the catch, allowing junior Rich Cesca to take home.  With the score now 5-2 and two runners in scoring position, North got out of trouble when Paliotta flew out to end it.

North tacked on a couple more off a 2RBI single by Margiotta.  South came up in the seventh fired up to come back and win it.  After Quigley replaced Margiotta pitching for North, Cesca knocked in an RBI single, which senior Andy Rose followed up with another RBI to put the Vikings within three. 

“We were working the count, from an offensive standpoint, and making their pitcher throw strikes,” said Michello.  “We were taking a pitch and then we got ourselves in some hitter’s counts and we were able to put the ball in play.”

South continued to show a lot of heart as they fought to regain the lead.  Quigley recovered however and finished strong by striking out Cory Bitts swinging to clinch the victory.

“I feel like we beat ourselves,” said Michello.  “I certainly want to give North credit, they played a nice game, but we left way too many runners in scoring position, we left way too many runners on base and made a couple errors that were costly.  When we had them up 1-0, we made an error and the momentum completely shifted and that’s when we left the door open and they came in charging, so that was the difference.”

For North, the win over their hometown rivals is huge going into the rest of the season.

“Wins like this, if we had scored three or four more runs and been through one, two, three in the last inning, but it just builds character.”

“This is a great, big win,” added Schulner.  “This is our fourth game, we’re 4-0.  Obviously our rival’s South and we just wanted to come out and work hard and we just did that.”

Though pleased with the win, Barbetto was not overconfident as he kept his eyes focused on their rematch at South on Wednesday at 4 p.m.

“It’s great,” said Barbetto.  “Now we’re undefeated still, 4-0.  We’ve got them again on Wednesday and we’ve got to come out strong again and fight.  They’re not going to take any [stuff] from us, so we’ve just got to come right back and fight.”