Lightning Baseball Highlights

Newtown Lighting Connecticut Senior Baseball League (19U) scores and highlights from this past week are as follows:

Newtown Lightning, 4 Danbury One 1: Using the powerful pitching arms of Bobby Archiere and Chris Haylon, the Lightning spoiled undefeated Danbury’s perfect record Sunday at Fairfield Hills Field. Facing a loaded Danbury team — featuring WestConn’s C.J. Sousa, Monroe College’s Garron Negron, former Danbury high school center fielder B.J. Nimer, and various former Abbott Tech players, Newtown jumped out to a 2-0 first-inning lead against Danbury’s ace pitcher Alex Johnson. Wyatt Depuy reached on a two-base throwing error by Danbury shortstop Danny Coakley, David Lucia walked, and Alex Lapinski reached on a force out. Michael Allwein ripped a clutch, two-out single to right field. The right fielder hastily tried to field the ball and booted it, allowing Lucia and Lapinski to score. Newtown’s lineup wasn’t intimidated by Johnson, an all-league player at Abbott Tech whose pitches were clocked at 85 mph during the game.

Newtown scored again in the third inning, when Lucia reached on a two-base throwing error by the second baseman, moved to third on a Lapinski grounder and scored on another error by Coakley. Danbury scored an unearned run in the fourth off Archiere, who did not give up a hit, struck out four, and walked five in four innings of pitching.

Newtown, which only struck out five times in six innings against the hard-throwing Johnson, added another run in the bottom of the fourth. Depuy walked and stole second. Ben Stoller crushed the longest drive of the day, but Danbury’s fleet-footed center fielder Nimer made a nice catch. Lucia drilled an RBI single to score Depuy. Haylon, who pitches for Franklin & Marshall College, pitched three shutout innings to get the save. With a runner on first in the fifth inning, Haylon fielded a sharp comebacker off the bat of former Abbott Tech star Devin Vitti and threw to shortstop Austin Ekstrom. The shortstop made a nice pivot and threw slightly off line to first baseman Stoller, who stretched to make the catch and complete a double play. Haylon struck out two batters in each of the final two innings to get out of jams.  The win boosted Newtown’s record to 6-2.

Newtown Lightning 2, Danbury Two 0 (suspended game): Newtown started the game by unleashing its most furious offensive attack of the season before rain, thunder and lightning stopped things last Friday night at Rogers Park in Danbury. The game will be resumed at a later date. All four Newtown batters in the first inning crushed the baseball. Brandon Cooper led off the game by ripping a double down the left field line. Ben Stoller drilled an RBI single to left field and stole second base. David Lucia smacked an RBI single to right to score Stoller, and Alex Lapinski blasted a single to right that moved Lucia to third base with no outs. With Eric Sutton batting, the thunderstorm arrived and suspended play.

Newtown Lightning 14, Pomperaug 5: The Lightning put together its biggest offensive output of the season, cracking 14 hits last week at Southbury’s Community House Field. Ryan Pisani led the offensive with three hits and three runs scored, and Eric Pisani was the winning pitcher. Eric Pisani also doubled and scored twice. Newtown scored four first-inning runs, highlighted by singles by David Lucia, Michael Allwein and Bobby Archiere. Allwein also blasted a seventh-inning double and scored twice. In the second inning, Wyatt Depuy whacked a long, two-RBI triple to right field that scored Ryan Pisani and Alex Lapinski. Archiere had the team’s other extra-base hit, ripping a fifth-inning double to left field. Austin Ekstrom played a flawless game at shortstop, and Eric Sutton relieved a tiring Eric Pisani in the fifth inning to get the save.

Danbury One 7, Newtown Lightning 2: Newtown struck for nine hits but stranded too many base runners last week at Rogers Park in Danbury. Alex Lapinski drilled three singles, David Lucia hit two singles, and Will Arndt led off the game with a double off the left field fence. Danbury’s Danny Coakley pitched a complete game and had three singles, and teammate Garron Negron hit two singles.