Bombers Win District Tourney And Will Play In States

The Newtown Babe Ruth 13-year-old Bombers captured the District Four title Sunday as they emerged unscathed from the loser’s bracket and beat Danbury twice on the same afternoon. The Bombers capped a run of seven straight tourney wins in seven days and advance to the state tournament this Saturday at Trumbull’s Unity Park at 10 am. The first round opponent will be District 2 winner Norwalk.

This marks the first district title in more than 25 years for a Newtown Babe Ruth team on the full-sized diamond.

The locals opened the double-elimination district tournament with a 6-1 loss to Ridgefield and had no margin for error the rest of the way through the tournament.

Newtown began its climb with a six-inning win over Newtown Gold as the Bombers’ Mike Koch belted a pair of triples to deep center field at Walnut Tree Field.

Newtown eliminated New Fairfield, 12-2, behind the efficient pitching of Koch, who had five strikeouts, and Jon Hull, who combined to allow only five singles and two walks. David Gerics led the attack with three hits and Dan Poeltl had a pair, including a double. The Bombers’ stingy defense turned in a nifty 5-3-2 double play — Mike Lengel to Hull to Chris Tenney — and first baseman Mike Allwein converted a nice defensive play for final out of the contest.

After a much-needed day off, play resumed on Thursday as Pomperaug — a combination of talent from Southbury and Middlebury which had nearly beaten Ridgefield the night before — arrived at Newtown High School’s field.

The Bombers prevailed 6-3 as Koch yielded a mere run in three innings before Poeltl came on with four innings of equally effective relief. The hurlers coughed up a only four free passes between them and benefited from strong defense, especially second baseman David Gerics’ creative look-back play that froze a runner at third, and Mike Lengel’s sprawling grab of a high pop down the third base line. Catcher Connor Blanc prevented any passed balls and played well behind the plate throughout the tourney.

Newtown defeated New Milford 9-3 on Friday. The pitching tandem of Andrew Kelley and Hull halted the host team’s offense. Nick Barreto made a nice shoestring grab in left field. Behind the plate, Tenney — spelling Blanc — pounced on a couple of bounced pitches and converted them into outs at third.

The heart of the Bombers’ batting order — Kelley, Kyle Wilcox, and Tenney — led the offense.

In a rematch with Ridgefield at Bethel Middle School on Saturday, Newtown rode the rubber-arm of Koch and the precision-arm of Poeltl to a 10-4 eight-inning triumph. The Bombers scored three in the first on Lengel’s two-out, base-clearing double. With the game knotted at 4-4 from the fourth inning on, Koch finally yielded to Poeltl to start the seventh, having thrown nearly 100 pitches and having allowed only two runs, one of which scored on a balk.

A single and stolen base put the winning run on second for the Tigers with no outs. One out later an intentional walk loaded the bases, but Poeltl escaped the jam with a pair of clutch strikeouts.

Top of the eighth, Wilcox cleared the bases with a double to spark a six-run inning.

Now only Danbury, which had beaten the Bombers in last year’s state tourney, stood in the way. Undefeated in the tourney, Danbury only needed one win and the Bombers had to win twice to advance to states.

Newtown seized the first game, 13-10, behind six gritty and masterful innings of relief pitching by Tenney, who mixed his pitches. Kelley led the sluggers with a booming triple. He reached base four times and scored three runs.

Barreto scored a pair of runs and Poeltl reached three times, stroking a double that split the outfielders. Joe Davis contributed a clutch two-out single that led to vital insurance runs. On the other side of the ball, first baseman Allwein snared a sliced grounder in the hole to help quell a three-run Hatters’ uprising in the sixth. Behind the dish, Blanc stopped everything.

Only 45 minutes later the teams met again in the championship game. Newtown prevailed 10-5 behind four remarkable innings of two-hit relief by Poeltl and a big day at the plate for Wilcox, who went 2-for-3 with a triple, reached base four times, and scored three runs. Hull, Barreto, and Kelley (2-for-3, two walks) all scored a pair of runs. Defensively, Davis stopped a rally with a good play at second, and the outfield played well. In the first inning, Barreto ranged deep into the outfield to pull down a 300-plus-foot fly ball. In the seventh, right fielder Wilcox unleashed a throw to Blanc at home for an out.

The heart of the Newtown order has had to step up its game to fill the shoes of Reid Schmidt, who is on the disabled list with a hamstring injury. In past years, Schmidt keyed the Bombers’ offense with his foot-speed and clutch power-hitting.

“From their first days together this spring, this group committed to working real hard and playing hard-nosed baseball,” said Josh Hull, the manager of the Bombers. “Their goal is to play with the discipline and focus of a top-notch middle school or freshman team. So far, it has paid off. We’ll cross our fingers and keep working hard in the states.”