Hurd Chevrolet Shut Out By Cranston

A lot can be done with just a little, and now the Cranston/Auburn Post 20 Junior Legion squad is aware of that.

Even after mustering just five hits and striking out nine times at the plate, Cranston prevailed in a 2-0 victory over Hurd Chevrolet on June 28 in Johnston in the first round of the American Legion Baseball playoffs, securing its 18th straight victory.

However, what may have saved Cranston was its pitching and defense. Starter Ryan Long went the distance, pitching seven innings, allowing five hits and striking out four. The Cranston defense did not record an error and also turned a double play in the second inning.

“In the field we did a great job of doing what we needed to do,” Cranston manager Nick Ruggieri said. “We hit our cutoff men and because of that we caught them off the bases a couple of times and got a couple of key outs in certain situations where I thought we were going to be in some trouble.

“Ryan did a great job on the mound. He’s done a great job all season long for us, really came through big tonight.”

There was concern early in the game that the Cranston bats were perhaps not as productive as normal, but Ruggieri gives credit to Hurd starter Steve Perfetto, who threw six innings and gave up the five hits and struck out nine.

“I think there wasn’t a lot going on because of the pitching performance by Perfetto, he did a hell of a job tonight,” Ruggieri said. “He’s a great pitcher.”

So instead of being aggressive at the plate and potentially racking up more strikeouts than needed, Cranston switched to a small-ball approach. Cranston hit only four balls into the outfield (two of its hits were infield singles).

“We had to kind of change our approach,” Ruggieri said. “We had to play some small-ball. Any time we got a hit the first thing that was going through my mind was hit and run, bunt, do all the small things we can do to try to scratch a run across.”

Cranston did score a run on an unorthodox play, which Ruggieri said he has never seen before. With Billy Clarwin on third and Long on second, Steve Bucci grounded out to short. Long dashed for third while Clarwin was still on the bag. Clarwin got a late start heading for home and was suddenly in a pickle between third and home. He scored when Hurd infielders didn’t make accurate tosses back and forth. Long was safe at third but was eventually stranded there.

“It wasn’t textbook, I’ll tell you that much,” Ruggieri said. “You wouldn’t tell anyone to do something like that but anytime at this level you get another team throwing the ball around and making so many throws things like that can happen.”

Cranston got its first run of the game in the second inning on an error by the shortstop which scored Joe Nicolace from third. Nicolace had the longest hit of the night, tripling to deep right-center. Koye Idowu (double) and Clarwin (double) were the only other Cranston batters to hit for extra bases.

Cranston and Hurd Chevrolet play tonight at 5:30 p.m. at Cranston West High School.