Pitching Reigns Supreme In Coral Glades’ Rainy 1-0 Win

For all of the fantastic baseball played on a nightly basis in South Florida, it’s important to remember that rain doesn’t quite get along with the national pastime. Wednesday night at Coral Glades, this was most evident as the Jaguars’ obtained a 1-0 victory over the Spanish River Sharks in a game that was unfortunately called in the bottom of the sixth inning due to rain.

“After the first five games, we really came out hard tonight to get a win,” Jaguars manager Mike Goulette said, admitted after his team’s second win of the season improved their record to 2-4 overall. “It’s unfortunate that the rain came in to spoil our fun, but we’ll definitely take the win.”

Leading the way for Goulette’s team was senior right-hander TJ Densmore, making his first start in 2016 after being sick to start the season. After a 2015 campaign that saw him record a 2.23 ERA in 34 innings, expectations are high for the senior star. But, as Wednesday night proved, Densmore is someone that can definitely handle the pressure. Only allowing two hits and striking out eight, Densmore did all he could to make sure the Jaguars came out on top despite any slight rust.

“TJ’s our horse and our ace,” Goulette said. “We’re going to ride and die with him and I was really impressed with him tonight. TJ told me he was ready to come out and throw and, as we saw, that was definitely what happened. He has no fear, and as a coach, you love that.”

Despite Densmore’s dominance, Goulette made it clear after the game that his starter would not have returned to the mound had play resumed. Starting first baseman and left-handed reliever Preston Vegotsky would have instead attempted to close things out for the Jaguars.

When you get the type of pitching that the Jaguars got from Densmore, all you need is one run to win and Coral Glades got that in a big way in the fourth inning. Driving in Coral Glades’ lone run was second baseman Robert Joy by way of a line drive single to right that drove home Steven Godoy, who himself had reached base by a one-out double.

Opposing Densmore on Wednesday was Cam Weinberger, who also pitched a complete game and only allowed five hits en route to taking the hard-luck loss for William Harvey’s team. Weinberger, even with the rain and a tough fourth inning, still managed to show off the skills that allowed him to go 4-2 with a 1.63 ERA across nine games in 2015. The 6’3″ right-hander struck out four and only walked one man after the first inning — that was an intentional walk of Densmore in the fourth inning.

Spanish River nearly broke through in the second inning following singles by designated hitter Nick Perez and right fielder Brandon Tritsch. But Densmore worked out of trouble to keep the game scoreless.

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