Newtown 9s Top Southbury For District Title

The Newtown Lightning 9 year old travel baseball team defeated Southbury 15-6 to win the Cal Ripken District 5 title on July 10. The Lightning struck for nine runs in the second inning, all coming with two outs, to take a 9-2 lead.

Southbury closed the gap to 9-6 after two innings, and got the leadoff batter on in the third inning, but Newtown turned the momentum when shortstop Luke Barrett snared a sharp groundball, and tossed to second baseman Michael Cotton, who fired to first baseman Todd Petersen for a double play.  After that play, Newtown tightened up the pitching and defense and added some insurance runs to coast to victory. Bryan Vander Have pitched three hitless innings in relief, inducing eight groundballs, five of them right back to him, to shut down the Southbury offense.

Vander Have, Todd Petersen, James Schumacher, Aidan Moulder, and Ayden Kasbarian all had two hits to lead the offensive attack. Shea Talbot slammed a two-run triple to highlight the scoring in the nine-run inning.

Because only two towns entered 9-year old teams into the district tournament, Newtown and Southbury faced off in a best of three game series. In the first game, Newtown came out swinging to jump on top with three runs in the first and five in the second for an early 8-1 lead, eventually winning the game 12-2 by mercy rule after five innings. Starting pitcher Tyler Fuori hurled three sharp innings, giving up only one run, and Vander Have followed with two strong innings to lead the Lightning.  At the plate, Vander Have lined three doubles, Cotton had two hits, and Jack Mulligan contributed a double.

The defensive play of the game was made by first baseman Patrick Hurley who took a throw for the out at first base and fired home to catcher Kasbarian who made the tag at the plate. Other nice plays on defense were made by outfielder Dan Mason and first baseman Petersen who caught sharply hit balls for outs in the second inning.

The Lightning earned a spot in the state tournament which will start July 23 in Bethel.