NEWS

Was it just three years ago that the Mystic Schooners were 9-31?  What a turnaround.  Mystic sailed into the Fay Vincent, Sr. Cup NECBL Finals with a 16-2 rout of the Newport Gulls.  Mystic, the #2 seed, will represent the Southern Division.
In a complete team effort, ten Schooners got hit and Mystic scored a run in seven of their eight innings.  Dan Hoy (Princeton/Sellersville, PA) homered twice and drove in five as part of a four-hit night.  Ben Ruta (Wagner/West Windsor, NJ) and John Brucker (Marist/Sparta, NJ) each had three hits and two RBI while Derek Jenkins (Seton Hall/Annandale, NJ) crossed home plate three times.  The offensive explosion backed up a strong start from Jesse Lepore (Miami/Beverly Hills, FL), who allowed two runs in six innings.  Mystic’s bullpen allowed just two baserunners in three shutout innings.
For Newport, Drew Lugbauer (Michigan/Pleasant Valley, NY) had two hits, including a two-run double.
Mystic will need one night to see who they play.  The 3-seed and host North Adams SteepleCats beat the #1-seed Vermont Mountaineers 3-1 to extend the Northern Division best-of-three finals to a third game.  North Adams DH Zach Wall (Young Harris/Hayesville, NC) led off the fifth with a home run and RF Parker Perez (Jacksonville/Winter Springs, FL) tripled two batters later and scored on CF Graham McIntire’s (Marist/Concord, NH) groundout.  North Adams received great pitching from Dakota Edwards (Bridgeport/Turlock, CA), who scattered eight hits and yielded just one run in 7.1 innings.  For Vermont, 1B Joe Dudek (Kentucky/Wall Twp, NJ) had two doubles, a single and scored the lone Mountaineer run.
Upcoming Games:
Aug 8- North Adams @ Vermont 6:30pm
Aug 9- TBD vs. Mystic TBD