RallyNorth.net

Tue, Apr 15, 2008 03:45 PM @ Pentucket

Team	Final
Newburyport	1
Pentucket	2

Pentucket gets by Newburyport

Wednesday, April, 16 By Dan Guttenplan
Sports editor

The state of the Newburyport and Pentucket baseball programs could easily be perceived as two teams moving in two different directions.

Starting with Newburyport, the Clippers are in the midst of rebuilding a program that won three straight Cape Ann League titles from 2004 to 2006. The Clippers struggled to a 10-11 mark last spring in their first season after the graduation of a strong senior class that included Joe Pace, Brendan Russell and Jared Notargiacomo. With yesterday's 2-1 loss at Pentucket, this year's Newburyport team dropped to 1-4.

Pentucket, on the other hand, went through a cold spell between 2004 and 2006 when Newburyport was thriving. Starting in 2004, the Sachems won 13, nine and eight games, by year. When Newburyport's CAL title run came to an end last season, the Sachems posted a 13-8 record, seemingly symbolizing a return to prominence. Yesterday's victory brought the Sachems to 2-0 on the season.

But yesterday's Newburyport loss did not give credence to the theory that the Clippers are far behind the teams expected to compete for a CAL Division 1 title.

Mental miscues | not talent | cost the Clippers in their third straight loss. For the fourth straight outing, the Clippers received strong starting pitching | this time from Kyle McElroy (6 innings, 0 earned runs). But errors and a costly base-running miscue made Pentucket's Joey Martin (7 innings, 0 earned runs) a worthy winner on the mound.

"I think we lack intensity and confidence," Newburyport coach Bill Pettingell said. "I can't explain it any other way. We make poor plays in the field at critical times. And we've been leaving guys in scoring position all year."

The Clippers have allowed three runs or fewer in four of their five games. Yesterday the Clippers were 1 for 8 with runners in scoring position. They left runners stranded on second and third in two of the first three innings.

"We're either not very lucky or not very smart sometimes," Pettingell said. "We made some (mental) mistakes on the bases. I'd rather lose 9-1 than these 3-2 or 2-1 losses. McElroy pitched a great game. He deserved better."

One ray of hope for the Clippers: Prior to this season, the last time they sat two or more games under .500 was April 22, 2004 when they started 3-5. That year's squad went on to win its next 10 en route to the first of three CAL titles.

Pentucket need not spend as much time searching for reasons for optimism. The Sachems' two victories have come against perennial CAL contenders | Amesbury and Newburyport | without the services of their No. 2 starter Bobby Maguire or catcher Peter Creamer.

"The strength of our team is we're only as good as the sum of our parts," Pentucket coach Tom L'Italien said. "We're not a one- or two-man team. It's important for other guys to pick each other up. This reminds us it's a total team effort."

Newburyport will host Amesbury on Thursday (3:45 p.m.) in a game that figured to see two CAL contenders competing for the upper hand. Now the game will have extra significance for different reasons. The squads will enter with a combined record of 1-9.

"We need a win," Pettingell said. "I think we're a better team than we've played. But we can't say we're better than anybody right now because we haven't proved it."