SALEM, N.H. – Back in 2018, Dom Toscano vividly remembers celebrating with his dad when the Boston Red Sox captured the World Series title.
It stoked his love and passion for baseball.
The following spring, his dad, John, purchased his son’s first glove and cleats and signed his 11-year-old son up to play in the Salem Youth Baseball program.
Six years later, the senior right-handed pitcher and power-hitter is one of the biggest reasons why the Salem High baseball team has gone from 4-15 to enjoying its best season in a dozen years this spring.
On Wednesday (4 p.m., Holman Stadium in Nashua), the surprising No. 11 seeded Blue Devils – fresh off knocking off No. 3 seed, Londonderry – will take on another “Cinderella” outfit, No. 10 seed Winnacunnet, which knocked out No. 2 seed Goffstown.
The winner gets a date in the state final on Saturday.
“(Winnacunnet is) obviously a Cinderella team just like us,” said Toscano. “I have looked at some of the film and their scores and they are playing very similar to us, making the right plays, hitting well, pitching and playing defense. I think we have the upper hand because we’re playing our best ball of the year.”
Toscano is certainly playing his best ball.
In the 10-0 playoff opening round win over Dover, he belted two home runs.
“I played there a couple of times in my career. I know their field is short and the wind is usually blowing out. But still, no one expected me to hit two home runs,” he said. “I was just trying to hit line drives.”
The line drives turned into his second and third home runs of the season and his fifth and sixth of his career.
“Dom has been a power guy for us (in our line-up). He hasn’t hit for a big average, but he’s starting to get hot at the right time,” said head coach Dan Keleher. “He doesn’t get cheated on his swings. He has a big powerful swing and that’s why he’s up there – to do that.”
“There was a knock on him that he couldn’t hit off-speed pitches, and he’s really worked on that. That second home run was a hanging curve ball, so he’s become a little more versatile in that respect,” noted Keleher.
Four days later, Toscano took the baseball, hoping he wouldn’t give up any home runs against the powerful Londonderry team.
“It was the biggest performance of my high school career, pitching in that game,” he said of his seventh career victory. “Londonderry is a very strategic team. Their lead-off hitter (Zachary Green) is a tough out. He had I think 31 stolen bases and really likes to bunt a lot.”
Green led off the bottom of the first drawing a walk, leading to two Londonderry runs.
“I was just missing spots. I’m a contact pitcher so after that I just said, ‘hey I need to throw some strikes’, and the next three innings went smooth,” he said, while giving credit to Jack Quinby who nailed down the save tossing 2.2 scoreless innings.
Toscano, who is now 4-1 with an 1.31 ERA on the season, will be attending Merrimack College in the fall to study finance. This week will mark the end of his baseball career. He would like nothing more than to celebrate a title, much like the Sox did seven years ago.
“If we can beat Winnacunnet, it would mean the world to me, and the world to all of us,” said Toscano. “If I’m able to step on the mound for the state championship game and lead Salem to its first state championship since 2003, that would be something special.”