First Loss For Archbishop McCarthy Comes At Hands Of Columbus

After winning the National and State Championship last year, the Archbishop McCarthy Mavericks decided they needed to stack their schedule again in order to prepare for the postseason. Friday night they played the first of many games on their schedule against some of the top teams in Miami, and they were stymied by a strong Columbus pitching performance, and a home run that made the difference in the game.

“Columbus is a good team and we hope these kind of games will help us come playoff time,” Mavericks’ coach Rich Bielski said. “We tried to stack our schedule with good teams to make us better.”

McCarthy will also face Belen Jesuit, Gulliver, American and Pace, all highly ranked teams in Miami-Dade county.

The story of this game was the pitching. Columbus’ starting pitcher Yency Almonte went six innings and recorded five strikeouts while allowing only three hits.

“Yency only pitched one-third of an inning last season,” Columbus head coach Karl “Joe” Weber said. “He really dedicated himself to pitching this summer and has just gotten better each outing.”

McCarthy’s pitcher Andre Martinez also had a great evening on the mound. Martinez struck out nine and allowed three hits in four innings.

The big difference in the game came early in the bottom half of the first inning. Martinez got off to a rocky start, walking the first batter and then giving up a double to Columbus’ Daniel Lynch. Then with two outs and a man on third and second, the Explorers’ second baseman Mike Obregon hit a shot over the “Blue Monster” in left field.

“Mike’s hit was huge for us,” Weber said. “I think with our pitching, we are a much better team playing with a lead.”

In the third inning, it seemed as if McCarthy was going to put a rally together with a man on first and third with one out. However, after a great pick-off move to first that got the baserunner caught in a rundown, the Explorer defense made a heads-up play, throwing out the lead runner at home trying to score. Almonte got a strikeout later on to end the inning.

The Mavericks changed pitchers in the fifth and the strikeouts continued. Nick Travieso came in to relieve Martinez and got three quick strikeouts to get out of the inning.

McCarthy made things interesting in the sixth once again when Jonathan Quintana reached base after being hit by a pitch. Nick Basto then singled right back up the middle, but an error by the Columbus center fielder allowed the runners to advance to second and third. Nick Travieso was up next and he hit a deep sacrifice fly ball to left-center that allowed Quintana to score from third, making it a 3-1 ballgame. But the Explorers were able to get out of the inning when Obregon caught a hard-hit linedrive at second base.

“We did some good things tonight,” McCarthy head coach Rich Bielski said. “We had more hits, struck out more batters and had less errors, but they had a big hit over the fence that was big.”

But Columbus would get the run right back when Daniel Lynch scored on a throwing error in the next inning. Then the Explorers brought in their closer Ryan Guerra to finish the game. After giving up a lead off hit, he settled down and struck out two to secure the win 4-1.

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