Baseball – Bergen Catholic snatches victory from St. Joseph

Bergen Catholic snatches victory from St. Joseph by Greg Tartaglia of The Record

MONTVALE – Vinny Martin won the game of inches not long after fearing he had lost it.

The Bergen Catholic center fielder tracked down a fly ball near the left-center field fence and snagged it for the final out of Monday’s 4-3 win at St. Joseph.

The victory pulled the Crusaders, No. 2 in The Record baseball Top 25, into a tie atop the Big North United Division with No. 1 St. Joseph. The teams are scheduled to meet at Palisades Park Sportsplex Wednesday at 7 p.m.

“We’re playing for a shot at the league title, and we haven’t had that since my freshman year,” Martin said.

The Green Knights (13-2) trailed, 4-1, entering the bottom of the seventh. An infield hit, a hit-by-pitch and a single loaded the bases with no out, and Bergen Catholic (11-3) responded by bringing in reliever Gerry Siracusa for a potential save.

Siracusa induced a pop-out to Martin in shallow center before Raul Ortega was hit by a pitch to force in a run. That brought up St. Joseph slugger Justyn-Henry Malloy (3-for-4) as the possible winning run, and he blooped a single into shallow center that landed just out of Martin’s reach.

Watch Martin’s big play and the final inning below: 

“I kind of slipped a little bit and let the ball drop in front of me,” the senior from Lodi said. “The run scored, so I kind of put us in that situation, but coach always preaches to us, never give up.”

Siracusa got the next batter looking at strike three for the second out – one of seven called strikeouts by Crusader pitchers. Designated hitter Johnny Medina then launched the shot that Martin corralled to end the game and leave each team with a 6-1 United Division record.

Both squads came in seeking to bounce back from a loss. Bergen Catholic scored a 1-0 win over Pope John XXIII on Friday, then fell to St. Mary on Saturday night, 3-2.

“We’ve played now three games in a row that I would describe as playoff games,” Crusaders coach Bob Muggeo said. “My goal, when we put our schedule together, was to get us ready for the end of the season – and hopefully face the [No. 1 pitchers] of the good teams, so that when we get to the playoffs, we’ll be a little more battle-tested.”

St. Joseph played its first game following a shoulder injury to senior standout Devin Ortiz, which occurred in Friday’s 6-2 setback to Pascack Valley. The Virginia-bound pitcher/shortstop is out indefinitely.

“It’s important that we came out like a team [Monday],” Green Knights coach Mark Cieslak said. “Yes, we did lose Devin, but at the end of the day, there’s 28 guys on this team. I’m confident in all of them, and I’m proud of the fact that they put the tying and winning runs on.”

Martin also thwarted a St. Joseph chance to tie in the bottom of the fifth. Leading 2-1, Bergen Catholic tried to pick off a runner leading from second base. The throw sailed into center field, where Martin collected it and threw a strike to catcher David LaManna, who tagged out the runner at home.

LaManna drove in the Crusaders’ first run with a first-inning sac fly, and winning pitcher Chris Gerard (3-1) made it 2-0 with an RBI grounder in the second. Gerard struck out 10 in six-plus innings.

Martin was involved in another unusual play when he reached base on a strikeout-wild pitch in the fifth. He scored from first on a double by Dom Cancellieri (2-for-2, two runs), and the sophomore later came home on a Ray Cortes sac fly.

“We’ve been playing small ball,” Muggeo said. “When certain guys are hot, you’re going to back off and let them take their hacks, but we’re not there right now. And especially early on, we were playing for a run [at a time], and it worked out.”