Townies win 1-0 over EG. Force Championship Final on Monday

The East Providence Townies faced elimination today as they have all post-season. They played with a seeming calm confidence as they outhit East Greenwich 7-3 and took the 1-0 win to gain a berth in the Division II State Championship game on Monday night. The title game will be back at RI College at 4:30 pm. The players and coaches may have remained calm in the low scoring game, but the crowd was nervous as the Avengers had the bases loaded in the 7th and last inning with a single, walk and a fielder’s choice. With a slim 1-0 lead, Dylan Annicelli reached his pitch limit and came out of the game to a standing ovation. The sophomore hurler pitched 6 and 2/3rd innings of 3 hit shutout ball. Enter senior Captain Jack McKnight from his third base position. Offensively, McNight had two hits and a long fly ball out to center field on the day. McKnight entered the game in a stressful moment with two outs and the tying run at third base. If McKnight didn’t show any nervousness, his Mom did. Kathy McKnight left her seat behind home plate and went to the side saying, “I can’t watch this.” But after McKnight battled East Greenwich’s Cade Thomas to a 2-2 count, two outs and bases loaded, Mom was yelling encouragement to the team. “You’ve got this,” she said. Jack McKnight then fired a called third strike by Thomas for the Townie win as the Townie fans jumped to their feet.

The crisply played game remained scoreless until the bottom of the fifth inning. Kyler Lorenz led off the frame with a single. McKnight was up next and showed bunt, but the pitch got by the catcher and Lorenz made it all the way to third base in a gutsy base-running move. McKnight flied out to center and Lorenz was held at third by coach Bob Rodericks on the medium depth fly out. Steve Estrella then lined out to center deep enough to score Lorenz for the eventual game winning run.

EP had a chance to score earlier in the third when McNight lashed a single followed by a Steve Estrella hit. With one out and two on base, Chico santos drove a hard bounding ball headed for right field, but the ball struck Estrella for an out and runners couldn’t advance. EG got out of the inning on a nice defensive outfield catch on a Tim Robitaille fly ball.

EG had some chances also but each time the Avengers had runners in scoring position, Annicelli would stop the momentum with great pitching and Townie fielders made catches in a well-played defensive game.

East Greenwich had a slightly better season long won-loss record than East Providence and this championship series has shown that with each team coming away with one-run wins. The Townies march through the playoffs began with a 9-1 win over Ponagansett. Next up Chariho nicked EP in an 11 inning 5-3 loss but EP came back with a 6-1 win over Westerly. EP then faced Chariho again and prevailed 2-1 to gain the finals against East Greenwich.

“One more game, one pitch, one at-bat, one play, one inning at a time,” said Townie coach Bob Rodericks after the game. “They (East Greenwich) are a solid team and will play with all they have tomorrow. But I like my guys. They’re playing well together, we combine defense, offense and pitching and we will play hard to win tomorrow,” added the coach. The Townies are young with just 4 seniors. Sophomore pitchers Tim Robitaille and Dylan Annicelli lead the young pitchers and the rest of the team is young with promising talent coming up from Junior Varsity and middle school.

Tickets for tomorrow’s championship game can only be purchased online from the RIIL at gofan.co. Tickets are $8.00 each.