AAABA Tournament: Laurel Auto needs 23 hits to outscore New York, 18-15

Aug. 06--JOHNSTOWN -- The pattern that unfolded at Point Stadium during Tuesday's AAABA Tournament second-round game was one that made for an exciting -- and long -- afternoon for fans in attendance.

Johnstown's Laurel Auto Group built a lead. The New York Hawks chipped away at it. Laurel Auto added to its lead. New York whittled away at it.

Eventually -- after 4 hours and 33 minutes -- Laurel Auto held off one last gasp by the Hawks in taking an 18-15 win and an afternoon date with Chicago Metro at Point Stadium in one of two winners' bracket games on Wednesday.

New York faces New Brunswick in an elimination-bracket game on Wednesday.

The game featured a combined 434 pitches split among nine hurlers. The teams combined for 41 hits with Laurel Auto Group posting 23, with every Johnstown starting batter but one collecting at least two hits.

For Laurel Auto, it was just a matter of surviving the Hawks and everything that they threw at the host city's second team.

"It was unbelieveable, it was a long game," Laurel Auto manager Mark Thomchick said. "A 9-0 lead? Hat's off to (New York). They can hit. they played really good defense, we made five errors that obviously didn't help us out. That let them fight and scrap their way back into the game, but that's a very competitive team over there."

New York, which scored 20 runs in Monday's win over Livonia, trailed 9-0 in the fifth inning when Ben Webb singled in Dom Farina with two gone in the inning. Zac Heide's towering flyout with the bases loaded was poised to put the game onto a path of a mercy-rule finish.

Again, this was a New York team that scored in clusters against Livonia on Monday.

"I'm very proud of the kids," New York manager Rico Pena said. "I mean, 9-0? In the fifth inning? They come back and we play an 11-inning game. We both wanted it just as much and they were the better team. They came up, they hit a lot and hit every pitcher we had (Tuesday)."

A.J. Gallo's triple to right off Laurel Auto starter Logan Urtz posted New York's first run before Manny DeLeon worked a walk and ended Urtz's afternoon on the mound. From there, Mike Nowicki allowed all three batters that he faced to reach base before handing the ball off to Alex Dirienzo. Edwin Hidalgo's infield single, plus an error from shortstop Rick Jones allowed two runs to score, making it 9-6.

Austin Mock added what appeared to be an insurance run in the Laurel Auto sixth, crushing a Yunior Munoz offering over the screen in left to give Johnstown a 10-6 lead.

At that point, it felt like the home run was exactly what Laurel Auto needed to seize momentum and put away New York.

It never quite panned out like that, much to the chagrin of Laurel Auto.

"It's tough, you start thinking (when will this stop?)" Mock said. "But you've gotta keep a positive mindset and keep going. They score three? We've gotta score four just to keep going. We did that, for the most part."

New York fired back, taking advantage of a pair of Laurel Auto errors and Gabriel Pena's sacrifice fly to right to pare the lead to 10-9.

Urtz's RBI single in the seventh swelled the Laurel Auto lead to 11-9, a lead that stood until the eighth when Daniel Mota stole third and reached home on a throwing error by Farina with Carlos Santos at the plate. After Santos worked a walk and moved to third on Hidalgo's double, he scored on a line-drive single from Francisco Ogando to tie the game at 11.

Urtz again delivered a run in the Laurel Auto ninth, sending a sacrifice fly to left to bring in Webb. After Jones was hit by a DeLeon two-out pitch, Heide crossed the plate when DeLeon was called for a balk, moving Jones to second.

Farina's single to center made it 14-11 two pitches later.

Gabriel Pena's two-run triple and a subsequent sacrifice fly from Adrian Pena made quick work of Laurel Auto's efforts to put away the Hawks.

Jones' RBI single in the 11th brought in Heide and opened Johnstown's ahead-to-stay rally against DeLeon.

Farina followed with a double that chased in Mock, who earned the win with two relief innings on the mound. Danny Clark's two-out single brought in Laurel Auto's last runs.

Adrian Pena's triple brought in Gabriel Pena to set the final.

Laurel Auto busted a scoreless tie in the third, sending 10 batters to the plate against New York's Calvin Luk. Gordon Barr and Jon White scored on Ben Webb's double to right-center.

Clark scored on a single from Heide while Urtz and Jones also drove in runs during the rally.

In the fifth, Jones doubled in Urtz and scored on a wild pitch with Clark at the plate a batter before Webb's single made it 9-0.

New York, which called on its bullpen to pitch 7 2/3 innings, was paced offensively by Hidalgo's four hits and RBI. Adrian and Gabriel Pena each drove in three runs while DeLeon, Gallo and Gabriel Pena each scored three runs.

Shawn Curtis is the sports editor of The Tribune-Democrat. Follow him on Twitter @shawncurtis430.

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