Somerset Academy Wins The Mingo Bay Classic

The Somerset Academy Pathers went on the road for Spring Break this year, enjoying some baseball in coastal South Carolina in the Mingo Bay Classic. Somerset arrived on a hot streak and left even hotter, finishing off a perfect week of baseball by defeating George Washington, West Virginia, 5-0 in the championship game Friday morning at Myrtle Beach High.

Xavier Moronta led the way on the mound, throwing six shutout innings. Moronta allowed two hits and two walks and piled up nine strikeouts. Juan J Teixeira then came on in relief in the seventh, striking out two to close things out. The offense had just six hits but managed plenty of runs with solid execution.

“It feels great,” Somerset manager Onel Garcia said. “This is our third straight Spring Break tournament championship. We love going on the road and building team chemistry and, at the same time, getting better as the year goes on. We’ve won eight games in a row now. Our pitching staff is very deep and our offense is coming around. We’re starting seven tenth-graders and a freshman, but they’re no longer young at this time of the year.”

Somserset scored the only run it ultimately needed in the bottom of the second thanks to fundamental execution. Gianny Galvez reached on an error and Max Baldaccini walked, and Kevin Iber advanced them into scoring position with a sacrifice bunt. Ryan Cabarcas then lifted a sac-fly to center to allow Galvez to tag up and score.

Moronta added to his own cause with an RBI single as Somerset added two more in the third, the other coming when Richie Larin successfully stole home. Michael Laguardia then pulled off a suicide-squeeze bunt to drive in Baldaccini in the fourth, and Miguel Useche had an RBI single that plated Jordan Carrion in the fifth.

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