CS Christian Overwhelmes Calvary in HSBN GOTW

Year in and year out, Coral Springs Christian and Calvary Christian have treated their fans to some of the most competitive district games in the county.

Taking advantage of an even bigger stage Saturday with this matchup being an HSBN Game of the Week, the two 3A-14 rivals brought out the fireworks as usual, but Coral Springs Christian’s display was a bit brighter as the host Crusaders hit their way to an 11-3 victory before a packed house.

A nine-run fourth inning proved to be too much for the Eagles (6-3-1) to overcome as the Crusaders (11-2), who are on a five-game winning streak, moved to 4-0 in the district. Calvary is 3-1-1 in the district.

Before the action on the field began, both teams had someone throw out a first pitch. The Eagles went with Phil Liberty, a major part of the program over the past few years. He announces home games and is at the center of sports information communication for the program.

Coral Springs Christian selected Nura Zanna, who spends his time on the basketball court rather than the baseball field. He’s the Crusaders’ all-time leading scorer and just led the team to its best season ever, earning the designation of Sun Sentinel Player of the Year. He will be playing college ball at Long Island University next year.

Once the first pitches were thrown, the teams got right into it. Calvary built an early lead as Keith Oren drove in Nick Kumar, who smacked a leadoff double to start the second.

CS Christian came right back in the bottom of the frame and plated a run. Eric Hepple hit a leadoff double and scored on James Buckley’s base hit. Hepple finished 1-for-2 with a double and two runs, and Buckley went 3-for-4 with four RBIs and a run.

Calvary shot right back in the top of the third, scoring a run when Andrew Gottfried came in on Luke Poirer’s base hit.

Coral Springs Christian took the lead for good in an ugly fourth inning that featured six walks and six hits, including two-run doubles from Touki Toussaint and Benito Santiago, who finished 3-for-4 with three RBIs, three RBI and two runs. Calvary used three pitchers in the inning.

“Everyone was having great at-bats,” Buckley said. “We were taking the right pitches, getting base hits. Everything was just flowing smoothly.”

Toussaint started for the Crusaders and although it wasn’t his best day, still was effective. He came out on fire, striking out the side to start the game but then had to slog his way through the next few innings. He allowed Calvary to load the bases in the fourth but got out of it by inducing a fly out. He struck out six, walked four and also hit three batters. Hepple pitched the final two innings.

“I just battled,” Toussaint said. “They’re a good team, didn’t get ahead of my fastball, and that’s pretty much it.”

Cleveland said he was pleased with Toussaint’s effort.

“I told him I was proud of the way he pitched,” Cleveland said. “He threw five innings. He left eight of their guys on base. He made the pitches when he had to. It’s funny because he’s a big prospect that he and everyone else expects him to just come out and strike everybody out, but he’s still only 16 years old. He’s just developing. He competed today. Whether or not he had his best stuff, I don’t really look to that. I look more to the mental side. Did he stay in the game. Did he make the pitches when he needed to. And he did, so yeah, he did what he needed to to keep us in the game and allow us that big inning, and that’s what good pitchers do. Nobody, not even big-leaguers come out and dominate every game.”

Calvary Christian Manager Gregg Mucerio also was happy with his team’s starting pitcher, Alec Berizzi, who pitched three and one-third innings before running into trouble in the fourth.

“I thought our starter did a good job,” Mucerino said. “He came out and did a nice job adjusting to the strike zone as well, seemed to be a little different. But you can’t give them the free ones in that big inning. That’s what got us. I knew we had a mental mistake on bunt defense, but I’m playing a guy at third that really hasn’t been there because we had a guy go down with an injury this morning, so it’s a strange turn of events. It’s OK. It’s a long season and we’ll get some things right, and we’ll be better for it in the long run.”

Cleveland said getting past Calvary is no easy task, and some of the new players on the team got their first taste of that.

“It’s always tough when we play them because they’re very well-coached,” Cleveland said. “They were swinging the bats pretty good, a couple hard hits and a couple balls fell in holes. We made one fielding mistake and gave them the second run. I just told my team when they came in after the third inning, I said ‘Welcome.’ A lot of these guys haven’t been in a game with that team. ‘So welcome to Calvary and CSCA. I said ‘Look, you have to continue to just have good at-bats.’ I thought we were having good at-bats and hitting the ball hard, but at people the first three innings.”

Said Buckley: “It’s just always a great battle. You always have to get prepared to play them. We know it’s going to be a battle until the last out. We just came out ready today.”

Santiago, a transfer from Flanagan, is new to the team this year but not new to the concept of a rivalry.

“Knowing you’re facing a rival, you know it’s going to be a great game,” Santiago said. “You know depending on how the game goes, you can go extras. You have to practice the whole week for this game. We practiced well this whole week, so we met our goal.”

Cleveland put things in perspective, knowing the battle was won Saturday, but not the war.

“We’re glad to get the win, but we know they have more in the tank, some guys we haven’t seen,” Cleveland said. “We just have to keep getting better.”

Leave a comment using your facebook account!